Warbird Information Exchange

That Picture of Ray Hanna was taken from the back seat of our E-model "Sue" AK899. It was on tour with Ray 1984-1986.

J-C 2 questions on AK899.
What happened to the "Sneak Attack" artwork on the rudder?
How did it get to the UK and back?
Someone earlier stated that it was flown over and back.

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Don't touch my junk!!

It was indeed.

..and by an amazing coincidence, ten years to the day prior to that, 30 June 1974, I was strapped in behind John Paul at Windsor, Ontario, engine running and ready to go...and we had a radio failure and aborted.

A shot from that day at Airwar74.

PeterA

Hi Jack,

The "Sneak Attack" rudder fabric finally gave up the ghost a few years ago and had to be replaced. The artwork lives on in my parents house and was framed and matted. At least now you can view the front and back of her at the same time! I'm lobbying hard to have it put back on and I believe the original artist is still alive.

John Crocker flew it over to England via Greenland. It was shipped back in a crate because my Dad did not want to chance repeating the "adventures" that were experienced on the way over.

It was sure cool to watch Ray Hanna fly that airplane at Duxford.

Here's my impression of a brief flight with Tiger Destefanie. The alierons are excellent, light and guick, elevator is heavier. The Allison sounds very smooth on the ground, but not quite as smooth as a Merlin in the air. The long nose seems to restrict landing view some, and pilots seem to prefer. It is physically hard to taxi, takes alot of muscle power to steer the tailwheel. It has a feel of quality construction, perhaps of an earlier design time.

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Bill Greenwood
Spitfire N308WK