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Visit the Vulcan Day - A Great Success!
Written by David Griffiths   
Apr 29, 2008 at 05:53 AM

Sunday 27th April saw the first of our Visit the Vulcan Days at Southend and it was a great success.  Around 200 people visited us during the course of the six-hour event and the VRT cleared well over £1000 from the various fund-raising activities surrounding the Vulcan. 

Cockpit Queue
Cockpit visits are a major attraction

Cockpit visits were of course the main attraction with Carol Whalley and Fiona Taylor manning the bottom of the crew ladder all day whilst VRT President, Norman Skinner sweated up in the cockpit showing visitors around.

Renee and Chris Parison
Renee and Chris Parison taking a breather from fleecing the public!
A special mention should go to VRT Members Renee and Chris Parison who operated the entrance gate with such persuasive aplomb that they managed to extract an extra £200 in donations from those entering and leaving the event - their technique was masterful and it is safe to say that a few decimated wallets left Southend on Sunday afternoon.

Vulcan Wheels
Vulcan wheels in various overhaul states
The VRT Engineers took time out from their busy work on our Return To Power programme to display their work in the marquee.  Four wheels in various states of overhaul were displayed along with PFCUs, components of the counterpoise plate, a recently overhauled crew seat and a jet pipe end cap in mid-repair.  Paul Hartrup put together a display of photographs showing our engineers working on the components and VRT Chairman, Kevin Packard's compilation DVD of taxi-runs provided a nice distraction running on a continuous loop in one corner of the marquee.

Matt and Ian talk to the public
Ian Tovell and Matt Lawrence talk to the public
Outside the marquee, Phil Whalley was taking photographs of willing punters sitting on the ejector seat we recently acquired from Newark Air Museum and making a good few quid for the Trust in the process.  The second hand book stall did steady progress as did the VRT Stand selling souvenirs and memberships. 

Crowd watching systems demonstration
XL426 is powered up to demonstrate the various systems
At 1 o'clock, one lucky (and generous) gentleman took the controls of XL426 for a systems run; he paid the princely sum of £20 to do this and had the pleasure of moving all the flying control surfaces, firing up the AAPP and operating the bomb doors.

Catering was ably handled by Aviator's Restaurant and they gave us a further donation of £30 for which we are extremely grateful.

The 2008 Prize Draw was launched with Gp Cp Bill Burnett arriving in his Yak-52 - G-OCBT, a ride in which, piloted by UK Aerobatic Champion, Mark Jeffries will be the first prize in the draw.

Many thanks to all of you who came along to support the VRT and we hope you'll pop back in June or maybe we'll see you at the Airport Open Weekend at the end of May.
Last Updated ( Apr 29, 2008 at 06:05 AM )
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