Now then everybody right here behind me is an Avro Vulcan fighter bomber,
once a mainstay of the RAF back during the cold war, and if you've got a long memory and can
remember one of the early James Bond films, it played a pivotal role in the film Thunderball,
it's one of the exhibits here at the East Fortune aircraft museum, it's about 15 miles to the east
of Edinburgh, it's a beautiful day I thought I would come along here and geek out on some of the
fabulous, fabulous aircraft they have on show here, so today we're going to see a Concorde,
we're going to see a DanAir Comet, we're going to see a BAC 1-11 and plenty of other
civil aircraft and military aircraft, so do you fancy joining me, welcome to RogVLOG,
East Fortune once was a functioning airfield, in fact, I think for a time it was actually
classed as Edinburgh airport before they built the main Edinburgh airport that we know at
Turnhouse so it's an extensive estate and it's built around a series of aircraft hangars,
the first hangar we're going to see today is the one they put the Concorde in,
but there's also a civil aviation hangar and a military aviation hangar,
so lots to see here at East Fortune, so should we go and get inside that Concorde hangar,
and this is hanger number four and this is where we're gonna find the Concorde,
oh my goodness, it always takes my breath away the first time I lay my eyes on the concord again,
so,
now East Fortune's Concorde is registered as G-BOAA, in fact, it was the first Concorde
to be registered, other aircraft in the fleet, some of which are in museums around the world,
ones at Manchester, one's in Barbados, I think there's one in New York,
there, one of the registration numbers was G-BOAC, which of course BOAC
was the original name for British Airways long haul, British Overseas Aircraft Corporation, BOAC,
they've even got some Concorde menus and cutlery and crockery,
plus some examples of seats from over the years,
all right then let's get on board the Concorde and see what it's like inside,
oh just have a look at that beautiful delta-shaped wing,
here we go after duck,
and that's the rear cabin, actually, the seats look a lot closer together than you think,
I always assume people had a lot of room on Concorde, but actually,
it was quite cramped wasn't it,
leather padding,
and those windows are really tiny as well aren't they, but then again this plane used to fly up
to 50 000 feet, so I guess they had to make sure that the fuselage wasn't too stressed out,
I've never been one of those vloggers who does toilet tours but hey this is Concorde after all,
look at all those controls and buttons and dials all analogue of course,
duck again,
what an incredible aircraft, I mean it looks so sleek and so modern, and to think that it
was designed in the 50s, built in the 60s, and was commercially successful from the
70s all the way through to 2003, is incredible every time I see the Concorde I am absolutely
boggled by just how incredible it is, but it's always with a tinge of sadness because I know
that even though I've flown in the Comet which we're going to see later, I know that I will never
fly in this Concorde, and here in the same hangar as the Concord at East Fortune we've got lots of
other things to see as well, now here are some gigantic engines, this first one is a
General Electric CF6, you're going to see those on Boeing 747s, and a little bit further along,
one of my favourites, a Rolls Royce RB211, you're going to have seen these on the Boeing
747 and their Boeing 767s of British Airways, and they're gigantic absolutely gigantic,
just think about the power that those engines create to get those planes into the sky,
and right up ahead of us is a Boeing 707, one of the first major transatlantic airliners,
oh and look at this it's one of the Red Arrows aircraft, one of those Hawk jets, that was one
of the things that I always used to love was when a Concorde used to join the Red Arrows and fly in
air displays, that was just an incredible sight sadly that we'll never ever see again,
well, that's the Concorde done and there's so much more left to see think I will go
and see the Comet next, the Dan Air Comet, and of course the Vulcan bomber, stick with me let's go,
check out this Green Goddess fire engine,
the Comet is looking a little bit bedraggled I have to say,
it's a real shame, but it's so good to see it out there in the glorious sunshine,
this Comet brings back so many happy memories of my childhood, that the last flight of this
de Havilland Comet, this particular specimen, was in September 1981, in fact, its last flight was to
this very airport where it stays now, I last flew in this exact plane in 1979 to Menorca
in the Balearic islands, how do I know that this is the plane because my Dad used to record the
registration numbers of all the aircraft we flew on and he wrote it down G-BDIX this very Comet,
let's take a closer look at that Vulcan bomber yeah if you can
remember back to Thunderball which I think was released about 1965 involved spectre
stealing some atomic bombs which were loaded onto these Vulcan bombers
sadly there are no more airworthy Vulcan bombers able to fly anymore, the last flight was back
in 2015 I think it was, fortunately, I was actually at one of the last flypasts,
it was right here at East Fortune and I do have a little bit of footage which I'm just
going to put on the screen now, it's not HD but just listen to the sound of those engines,
next up I think we'll try the indoor displays, and to get there we've got to walk right across the
airfield, now I really do get some sort of World War II military vibes from the layout here at East
Fortune, the Fantastic Flight hangar is all about the mechanics of flight,
so lots of exhibits to explain air flow, and wing construction, and that sort of thing,
well, that was really interesting, I felt like a great big kid,
I am a great big kid, let's check out this British Airways BAC 1-11, now I remember flying to the
south of Spain on one of these with the airline Courtline in the 1970s when I was very very young,
I always used to love the shape of the BAC 1-11, well like the Comet, the BAC 1-11 looks like it
could do with a lick of paint, but I guess they just haven't got the funds for that sort of thing
here at the museum, but it's still great to see these things preserved under the wing we go,
now that engine is a Rolls Royce Spey engine, named after the river in the north of Scotland,
it's an interesting fact that most Rolls Royce engines were named after rivers,
the Spey, the Avon and the most modern engines that appear on the A380 and a lot of the air
buses is called the Trent engine, funnily enough, the only engine that Rolls Royce
produced that wasn't named after a river was the RB211 that we saw in the Concorde hangar,
what's been so good about today is that there's hardly anybody here, it
almost feels as if I've got free reign, Scottish Ambulance Service, Britain Norman Islander plane,
you normally see me do this with castles, but it applies here too, feel the power of history
look at this one look at those huge windows
you get a great view out of those it's called a de Havilland Dragon,
I guess because I've done so much business and leisure travel over the years,
I tend to favour civil aviation, I just love passenger aircraft and the history of passenger
jets, and my goodness is there a lot of history inside that hangar, but it's always good to look
at what came before the things we take for granted today, the Boeing 737, the Airbus A320,
millions of people fly on them every day, but if it wasn't for those
amazing aircraft from the past, we wouldn't have the amazing aircraft we have today,
and so to the final hangar on our tour this afternoon, the military aircraft hangar
the pink aircraft is a Jaguar, behind it I think that's a Tornado, we'll have to check the green
aircraft is a Lightning, I used to remember seeing those as a boy growing up near Warton, somebody
described it as basically a seat on top of a jet engine, and of course the Harrier Jump Jet
yes it was a Tornado there are some incredible military aircraft in here
and of course, it wouldn't be a military aircraft display without a Spitfire
that's a Spitfire engine it's called a Merlin, so I was wrong earlier when I said that they
were mainly named after rivers, unless there's a river called a Merlin, of course,
well, that's the military aircraft hangar done, and again there's some incredible stuff in there,
the Spitfire is amazing, hadn't realized they also had the Tornado, the Lightning
and the Jaguar, so maybe I was a little hasty earlier on to say that I'm
more in favour of civil aviation, because that was fascinating as well,
the last time I was here at East Fortune was for the Air Show back in 2019,
now they always have an air show every July, except of course for the last two years, because
of the pandemic, but today it's the first time I've actually been to the museum to have a proper
look round for over a decade, and they've got so many new exhibits that I haven't seen before,
it's absolutely fascinating and something for all the family, so I really would recommend you
getting yourself down here to East Fortune and just luxuriate in all this aviation memorabilia,
If you enjoyed this episode of RogVLOG please do subscribe to my YouTube channel,
until the next video remember there's always something to see so get out there and find it.