RAF Bruntingthorpe
The base can be dated back to 1942 in the midst of the second world war hosting the USAF and RAF and was used until 1973 when it was sold to Chrysler for testing vehicles and later Peugeot in 1983.
The site today is owned by the Walton family who, according to a local, bought the whole site for £1. The airfields usage for vehicle testing, development and storage allowed for the owners to purchase multiple aircraft with preservation groups restoring them to former glory as part of the cold war museum or separate exhibits such as the super guppy. The site overtime has had multiple aircraft stored onsite with notably a former airfrance 747 being blown up as part of investigations into terrorist bombs in 1997.
As of recent, just before the second visit, it was announced that the Cox automotive group would take over the site for storage of more cars. Although still owned by the Walton family this has caused a lot of concern for the aircraft here it is said some of the preserved planes are to be moved to other aerodromes such as Kemble with the others left in an uncertain situation with the likelihood of the 747s to be cut up as they are far from operational. The RAF lockheed tristars also stored on site are destined a similar fate.
The Visits
I had these planes on my pinned for a little while after spotting a trio a planes parked questionably close together and then later noticing a shell of a 737 laying near the runway. Eventually after some time it turned out these had all be decommissioned a left to rot. I then forgot about it for a little while until we cancelled an explore up North and this came to mind as a back up. After some careful research it made sense to go at night and lower our risk of capture.
The second visit was just as covid lockdown had started to ease and it seemed like the ideal place for a quick nose to get my head into exploring once again and was somewhat more enjoyable in the daylight and to tick off a few remaing things I missed.
The Planes
I managed to cover four aircraft on this visit in varying states of disrepair.
SX-OAD built as a Boing 747-200 series this aircraft was fist delivered to Singapore airlines in 1979 as registration 9V-SQI and flew with them until transferred to the Greek Olympic Airlines in 1985 flying with them until its retirement in June 2002 where the aricraft landed at Bruntingthorpe.
Being the first aircraft we entered we were rather disappointing, it appeared everything had been stripped out and makeshift walls were placed around presumably for police training or something.
Anyway, moving on.
The next aircraft on this visit was one of two former tranareo 747s
VP-BGX is a Boeing 747-300 series delivered to Japan Airlines in 1988 and later being tranferred after a years storage to Tranareo airlines in 2008 where the aircraft served until 2012 when it made the last of its landings at Bruntinghorpe.
External image from another site shot in 2013.
By the end of this visit we were being battered by heavy winds which kept sliding mangled metal parts around on the planes, constantly keeping us on edge eventually we gave up and headed home.
The second visit.
After find the entries to the two previous planes were sealed we were left with no option but to give VP-BGY another go which was a success with a rather unexpected entry.
This aircraft served a similar life to VP-BGX so there no point in going over it.
Across the site lays the corpse of G-BVKB a former British Midland International Baby, BMI Baby, Boeing 737-59D.
The aircraft today has no wings, horizontal stablisers, seats, in-filight drinks or landing gear and sits on the ground becoming one with the woodland.
Anyway, that'll be all.
Since this visit the 747s have all be shifted about to make room for more vehicle storage which will make future visits difficult.
,
The base can be dated back to 1942 in the midst of the second world war hosting the USAF and RAF and was used until 1973 when it was sold to Chrysler for testing vehicles and later Peugeot in 1983.
The site today is owned by the Walton family who, according to a local, bought the whole site for £1. The airfields usage for vehicle testing, development and storage allowed for the owners to purchase multiple aircraft with preservation groups restoring them to former glory as part of the cold war museum or separate exhibits such as the super guppy. The site overtime has had multiple aircraft stored onsite with notably a former airfrance 747 being blown up as part of investigations into terrorist bombs in 1997.
As of recent, just before the second visit, it was announced that the Cox automotive group would take over the site for storage of more cars. Although still owned by the Walton family this has caused a lot of concern for the aircraft here it is said some of the preserved planes are to be moved to other aerodromes such as Kemble with the others left in an uncertain situation with the likelihood of the 747s to be cut up as they are far from operational. The RAF lockheed tristars also stored on site are destined a similar fate.
The Visits
I had these planes on my pinned for a little while after spotting a trio a planes parked questionably close together and then later noticing a shell of a 737 laying near the runway. Eventually after some time it turned out these had all be decommissioned a left to rot. I then forgot about it for a little while until we cancelled an explore up North and this came to mind as a back up. After some careful research it made sense to go at night and lower our risk of capture.
The second visit was just as covid lockdown had started to ease and it seemed like the ideal place for a quick nose to get my head into exploring once again and was somewhat more enjoyable in the daylight and to tick off a few remaing things I missed.
The Planes
I managed to cover four aircraft on this visit in varying states of disrepair.
SX-OAD built as a Boing 747-200 series this aircraft was fist delivered to Singapore airlines in 1979 as registration 9V-SQI and flew with them until transferred to the Greek Olympic Airlines in 1985 flying with them until its retirement in June 2002 where the aricraft landed at Bruntingthorpe.
Being the first aircraft we entered we were rather disappointing, it appeared everything had been stripped out and makeshift walls were placed around presumably for police training or something.
Anyway, moving on.
The next aircraft on this visit was one of two former tranareo 747s
VP-BGX is a Boeing 747-300 series delivered to Japan Airlines in 1988 and later being tranferred after a years storage to Tranareo airlines in 2008 where the aircraft served until 2012 when it made the last of its landings at Bruntinghorpe.
External image from another site shot in 2013.
By the end of this visit we were being battered by heavy winds which kept sliding mangled metal parts around on the planes, constantly keeping us on edge eventually we gave up and headed home.
The second visit.
After find the entries to the two previous planes were sealed we were left with no option but to give VP-BGY another go which was a success with a rather unexpected entry.
This aircraft served a similar life to VP-BGX so there no point in going over it.
Across the site lays the corpse of G-BVKB a former British Midland International Baby, BMI Baby, Boeing 737-59D.
The aircraft today has no wings, horizontal stablisers, seats, in-filight drinks or landing gear and sits on the ground becoming one with the woodland.
Anyway, that'll be all.
Since this visit the 747s have all be shifted about to make room for more vehicle storage which will make future visits difficult.
,
