Duxford

When I was a child, Concorde was the symbol of the future.

And then very quickly, there's a Concorde in the Imperial War Museum in Duxford, near where we are now in Cambridge, and it's there as a relic of the past.

And it's like, you know, it's like those things that go from being impossible to being inevitable, things that go from being the future to being the past very quickly.

Is that part of what's driving this move towards private enterprise, the corporate version, and also then eventually the ideas of people like Ayn Rand, that the state was behind these big endeavors, state funding lay behind the technological developments, and they just gave up.

He arranged to have her shipped back to England, and then the real work began.

The restoration was carried out by the team at Historic Flying Limited, based at Duxford Airfield in Cambridgeshire.

Duxford is the home of the Imperial War Museum's aviation collection, and it is one of the most storied airfields in the world.

Spitfires and Hurricanes flew from Duxford in the Battle of Britain.

Walking the flight line there You can feel it in the pavement.

The restoration team at Historic Flying Limited was experienced.

That is a calling.

And as long as there are people willing to answer that call, the Merlin will keep singing over the English countryside.

Welcome to Digging for Britain.

[pen scratching] [upbeat music] I've come to the Imperial War Museum in Duxford, Cambridgeshire.

It was from this airfield that the first Spitfires took off for the Battle of Britain in July 1940.

Countless Allied missions flew from airfields right across Britain, heading for Nazi occupied Europe.

Not a museum piece, an aircraft.

Information today came from the de Havilland Aircraft Heritage Centre, Tony Butler's research on British wartime aircraft development, and structural documentation from the Aircraft Restoration Company at Duxford.

More at radiohanger.com. I'm Taildragger.

Keep the Merlins turning.

The Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum in Hamilton, Ontario has one.

The Imperial War Museum at Duxford has examples.

It is worth making the trip to any of them if you ever have the chance, just to stand next to the thing and look at it.

Because when you get close to a Mosquito, what strikes you is not how modern it looks for its era.

In achieving the RAF rank of squadron leader.

Returning to the Belgian Air Force in 1946, Van Lierde was made d- uh, deputy chief of staff in the Ministry of Defence in 1954, and in 1958 he became the first Bel- or first Belgian to break the sound barrier while test flying the Hawk Hunter at Duxford, uh, Air- Airdrome in England.

He went on to hold several important command positions before retiring in 1968.

So this is the credibility of this man.