Unexpected Surprise

This past weekend I attended a large festival at the Lincolnshire Campground called Grapevine with my family. As we were setting up camp I heard a low rumble in the distance and saw this little dark speck growing bigger and bigger and from one of our party I heard a most excited voice yell "IT'S A VULCAN!" (The voice turned out to be attached to our Pastor who grew up watching Vulcans and B-52s around the area on a regular basis, he hadn't seen a Vulcan in the air since the early 1980's.)

And so it was. It made a low pass perpendicular to the runway at RAF Scampton (home to the Red Arrows) and circled around for a gear-up approach. I lost it in the trees and then, in a glorious knife-edge style it emerged, clawing into the sky and continuing to some unknown destination.

It was marvelous and I was fortunate enough to have my wife's Canon S3 handy to get a couple of images. The Vulcan XH558 is privately funded by the Vulcan to the Sky Trust and more information about the struggle to put this cold-war bomber back into the sky can be obtained by visiting their website here.