Our Illustrious Leader

[Bill Murray]

Priceless

Bill

[Tony Wheeler]

Hilarious!

[Lynn Eades]

Is this the pre cursor to British Airways? Does the flag stay there in flight?
What is the make and model?..... A big biplane, much too big for a Sopworth Camel, but in the right company

[Keith Webb]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eades

Is this the pre cursor to British Airways? Does the flag stay there in flight?
What is the make and model?..... A big biplane, much too big for a Sopworth Camel, but in the right company

It's a Handley Page HP42 airliner, in service throughout the 1930s and very safe with no passenger injuries in that time.

[Richard Farrant]

Originally Posted by Keith Webb

It's a Handley Page HP42 airliner, in service throughout the 1930s and very safe with no passenger injuries in that time.

Keith,
One of them, Hannibal, was lost without trace during WW2 in the Middle East with crew and four passengers missing.
http://www.rrhobby.ca/Hannibal/flight_cw197.htm

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Ah yes, Handley Page H.P.42 G-AAUD Hanno. Big, strong, reliable - that I bear the same name is a coincidence

See the Wikipedia entry for a short history and the origin of it's name:

G-AAUD, production number 42/3, was named after the Carthaginian explorer Hanno the Navigator, who explored the Atlantic coast of Africa in approx. 570 BC. Hanno first flew on 19 July 1931 and was later converted to a H.P.42(W) (Hannibal class). The aircraft was impressed into No. 271 Squadron RAF and was destroyed in a gale at Whitchurch Airport, Bristol when it was blown together with Heracles and damaged beyond repair on 19 March 1940.

G-AAUD Hanno starred in the 1937 short film, Air Outpost - 24 Hours at the City and Airport of Sharjah in the Persian Gulf.

[Gunner]

Lots of STRUTS!!!

Cheers! Mike

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Big, strong, reliable - that I bear the same name is a coincidence

Perhaps so Hanno, but nevertheless not inappropriate for a Dutchman, given your mob's fame in the realm of early maritime exploration. With which we're well acquainted here, living as we do in New Holland, with Van Diemen's Land lying just south of us, and New Zeeland to the south east!

I've sometimes wondered how we finished up speaking English instead of Dutch, perhaps it had something to do with Jan Carstensz, who in 1623 reported to the Dutch East India company of seeing "a dry land, no use to mankind, whose inhabitants were the poorest and most wretched creatures ever seen''!

Hardly a glowing report, and it would be another 150 years before the Poms arrived, and only for the purpose of sending convicts here, because the Yanks had recently stopped them sending convicts there!

Funny how world history can turn on such tiny events as Jan Carstensz's report. Of course, some may be inclined to agree with his assessment of the place even today!