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During my US Navy days, my Frigate was coming into NorVa when we saw one of the British aircraft carriers visiting on her way home from The Falklands. She looked very weathered and bedraggled but also proud. I don't know whether it was HMS Hermes or HMS Invincible, but it's the only British carrier I ever saw. Later on deployment to the Med/IO, we were tied up in Mombasa, Kenya for a week. Getting a beer at The Seamens Mission, a sort of club for all sailors, we saw on their wall a ship's plaque from the HMS Sheffield, lost in the war. We all hoisted a beer in honor of the ship and her crew. 😎👍

I grew up in England near a major airport, and was a plane spotter as a boy. We got mostly civilian types flying over on their approach, to land but one day I was in the garden practicing my fly fishing casts and I heard this incoming roar from a different direction. A low flying Vulcan appeared overhead, and it to this day is the most impressive sight and sound that I've seen in the sky, fifty years later.

I saw one about 100m away as I was walking along a cliff on the Yorkshire coast about 50m high. The Vulcan was probably about 75m altitude, flying parallel, and just floating along slowly. It hardly made noise until it sped up and made a tight turn and climbed really fast. Then you could hear and FEEL it's POWER. My dog was as startled as I was.

I was living on Tyneside. One summers day in the mid 1970s my wife and I took an elderly aunt from London to the Scottish border at Carter Bar on the A69 so she could put her foot in Scotland. From a position near the sign welcoming visitors to Scotland we looked down into Scotland and the Vale of Tweed. Suddenly something was moving against the landscape. There below us we looked down onto the backs of a pair of Vulcans as they climbed towards us. Seconds later we heard the iconic howl of Vulcans’ engines followed almost immediately by the stupendous roar as they skimmed at what felt like an few metres over our heads before they descended down Redesdale before they disappeared towards Catcleugh Reservoir. My aunt, a resident of Mill Hill in London was totally impressed and for years afterwards told of the day a Vulcan nearly took her hat off!

Many years ago, my Dad and I were walking along Hadrian's Wall on a typically misty Northern English/ Southern Scottish day. As we crested a rise, everything suddenly went black. We were looking at the belly of a Vulcan on a hedge hopping exercise! We spun around only to see her pull into a steep climb into the low lying clouds and disappear, as the Vulcan Howl and the smell of jet fuel washed over us! What a memory.

The corridors of Whitehall buzzed, whilst showing footage of Greenwich. The B1 didn't have straight leading edges to the wings, that was dropped on the prototype. The production version had kinked wings, but were smaller than on the B2. The RAF didn't change to low level attacks until Gary Powers was shot down, so in the 1960s. No redesigning was done by Avro for the switch, it was the only V bomber solid enough to take the strain, apart from the prototype Valiant B2 Pathfinder, which was faster than the Vulcan at low altitude. The redesign was so that the B2 could fly even higher and faster.

So many happy memories of seeing XH558 at airshows and when it did its farewell tour. The manoeuvres that the pilots pulled off in displays were incredible and that howl was something special.

It was my first operational aircraft that I had the pleasure to work on as a young airman at RAF Cottesmore in 1968 & 1969. Only 2 years but it has stayed fondly in my memory still today. ❤

I lament the retirement of ghe Vulcan. We sometimes used to fly escort, in our F6 Lightnings, and when THAT magnificent warbird itself retired, I felt my life was over. As I now look back at my life, I concede, it's been a fulfilling thrill ride, but fast coming to its indvitable teminus.

When I was in SAC , stationed at Barksdale AFB, A Vulcan on its way to Falklands stopped in. We had an impromptu air show and party in honor for them. We flew some B52’s with some A10’s and the Vulcan did some passes. They sure had a howl that you wouldn’t want to hear if you were on the wrong end. It was an older aircraft that while it was in good condition was starting to show its age.

I remember seeing a Vulcan flying over Chicago during an air show. LOUD and very impressive.

I grew up on Vulcan bases, my dad was an armourer who loaded the blue steel nukes. A little known fact, kept quiet at the time for obvious reasons, was that Vulcans penetrated US airspace and successfully dropped 'nukes' on their targets in 1961.

There's a cemetery nearby where I live. I would walk through to cut time to get to a walking trail I use. One day, I noticed some graves with small Union Jacks placed in a row. I wondered why, this is Detroit. After researching, I read that a Vulcan crashed near downtown Detroit in the 50's. Never knew of these bombers before then. Very fascinating aircraft.

3:00 - B35/46 wasn't a clandestine file that landed on a select few desks in the air ministry. It was a specification issued to British aircraft manufacturers, inviting them to design a jet-powered nuclear bomber. Three of them responded and rather than choose a single design the government went for a belt and braces approach and commissioned all three. The V bomber programme wasn't envisaged as a triad - that's just how it ended up. The Vickers Valiant wasn't chosen for its "overwhelming firepower" but because it was the most conventional design so could be in service quickly as a stop-gap.

I saw the Vulcan fly in 1966 at an airshow at Willow Grove Naval Air Station in Pennsylvania. It must've been on some sort of good will tour. I saw (and heard) it take off and perform maneuvers that no bomber should've been able to perform. It was LOUD, and I remember that howl to this day. Truly a msjestic aircraft!

Built by the same company as the Lancaster and the first flights of the two aircraft were only 11 years apart.

I worked on the Vulcan for about 4 years doing major servicing. We stripped the aircraft of all its major components, stripped the paint off and replaced many of the skin panels. Then it was repainted and reassembled with many new parts. It then flew for another 4 years. I must have worked all of them flying in the early 80s.

I once chatted to a retired RAF Group captain (or was it wing commander??) who recounted a moment at a joint exercise in the US where the 'opposition' USAF general he was with was shouting "Go man GO!" as they watched a vulcan banking through the mountains of the exercise range on its' way to the target - basically NoE though the mountains in a Vulcan .... I wish there was video of that!!!

The image used for the video thumbnail is that of Avro Vulcan XM573, Located at the Strategic Air Command and Aerospace Museum in Ashland, Nebraska, USA. I actually work there and can confirm that she’s undergoing a full static display restoration.

I remember being on a small English mountain and hearing an airplane, after looking all over the sky and seeing nothing, i gave up and started to continue on my journey only to see the top of a Vulcan flying through the valley. I was awe struck, obviously.

I love the Vulcan it was such a nimble bomber for the era it was pretty cool and futuristic looking

My great grandad (a polish refugee during ww2) worked for avro and built vulcans he even continued working for avro during the falklands. He briefly worked on lancasters as well i believe (side note its mad that the lancaster and vulcan are less than one generation apart from eachother)

I got to see one fly at the open house air show at DM AFB in Tucson back in 78. It was the most graceful thing I think I'd ever seen in the air.

My father worked as a civilian at Kindley AFB in Bermuda in the late 1950's through the early 1960's. There were occasionally air shows and he would take us to them. We had old family movies of us being at one of these shows. There was a Vulcan at one particular event, and my father included it in our family home movie that day. It was a cool looking aircraft, then and now.

I have never forgotten a most memorable event that my mum and I had going on the A30 one day up to Worthing! This was in the I think early eighties! We had the sunroof open and heard this low flying aircraft, getting closer and closer and then it almost went pitch black! I looked up and it was a low lever Vulcan flying over head! I have never forgotten the shear amazing event! We both had that day! They were such memorable aircraft to behold!! I have never forgotten it!

I personally think that the Vulcan is the most elegant looking bomber ever made 🇬🇧

The Iron Triangle was one of it's names. One day in the 1970's we went to the Abbotsford Air Show in Canada, and they had a Vulcan. The Abbotsford airport is based on an old WWII training field with the three runway triangle. The Vulcan when it flew was able to perform a turn within that triangle that was about 4000 feet per side. It was very impressive seeing that bird on its side during that turn. It also, when on the ground, provided a lot of shade to those of us sheltering under the wings. While there my dad was giving us kids a lot of information on what the paint codes ment, what the various hatches and doors on the underside of the wings were for (and which ones were new). He couldn't tell us how he knew all this, just that he did. Many years later, just before he passed, he told us that he had worked in a development team that worked on the Vulcan and other aircraft parts in the 1950s.

The noise out of the VULCAN is mesmerising but yet also scary AF..

I remember as a youngster seeing one at RAF Biggin Hill Air Show, and years later as a young adult at RAF Manston Air Show. My jaw dropped both times at its' timeless elegance and beauty, which gave it permission to be fecking noisy!

I don't know what's most impressive the howl or the feeling of the sound - you definitely could feel the sound. You hear it coming thinking it's loud then it's given full throttle into a steap climb - you know it can be loud - but dang - it got you. The Lightning was also impressive being an intercepter - it could pull some nice moves. Then seeing a Shackleton getting to know it was still in active service. The Vulcan was retired - the Lightning were having a few years left - I think it was in the mid 80's I saw all three of them the same day. It just seemed to defy logic the Shackleton was still in service as an AEW - as I recall they were stationed in the former West Germany - patroling up and down the "Iron Curtain" - apparently doing it well. I've got this picture in my head of the Shackleton flying to the American Sector in Berlin. A guy has just received his "Trabi" (Trabant) after waiting+15 years after applying for a car - giving his car a good wash and some TLC - looking up in the sky seeing a Shackleton - watching in disbelief - wondering what cars they drive in the West - clapping his car gently with passion.... Thinking the East German propaganda is being nice to the West feeling lucky to have a "Trabi". Wondering if they even got cars for private use... Feeling "The Wall" serves a great purpose of keeping the West out... I do like the Shackleton - It just felt so out of time. The Vulcan is a timeless beauty - the Lightning didn't look new - but still had great performance. The Shackleton just looked like it was much loved and no one would like to be the one saying it's time to leave. I went home trying to figure out what it was. Later I saw a documentary... made just before it was retired. That made me sad - someone had dared to say it's over... I just got to like the dam'n thing. You know it's being replaced with something better - still a part of you want it to stay.

If I'm remembering this correctly, Vulcans successfully "nuked" the USA during wargames back in the Sixties or Seventies. And I think the Vulcan was the very sort of bomber Germany's more ambitious and innovative designers hoped to build during World War II.

I was fortunate enough to see the Vulcan fly at the Abbortsford, BC airshow, beautiful and ominous.

Along with the amazingly brilliant Lightning, this is my favourite British jet and a total icon

I saw a Vulcan bomber fly over my house in May, 1982, which was something I never expected to see, given that I lived in NW Arkansas. I was in the house, when I heard a jet flying over, which was not unusual, since business jets often landed at the local airport a few miles to the south, & sometimes I would go outside to watch the jets fly over, on final approach to the runway. It seemed like this time however, the jet sounded different than usual, & when I saw it, I knew immediately what it was (since I was a military aircraft enthusiast), & realized that the Vulcan bomber had to be part of the Falkland Islands operation. The Vulcan was flying at a low enough altitude that I could clearly see the British roundel insignia on the underside of the wings, & thought the aircraft might be preparing to land at the local airport, so I called the airport, & was told it didn't land, but only flew over the airport. Seeing the Vulcan (basically, by luck) was definitely an interesting & unexpected sight for me (probably the one & only time)!

I can remember the Vulcan at the Biggin Hill airshows you often heard and felt its approach long before you saw it, the to see it turn and climb so tightly and nimbly made it look like a giant fighter rather than a bomber, 1 show i was at they suspended take offs for 5-15min as the Vulcan did a Scramble take off with full afterburners not only was the noise intense but it liquidised the part of the runway you could see the heat radiating up. I read the US invited the Vulcans to war games to practice defence and the Vulcans always got through undetected due to counter measures the Volcan had, one landing at a major us airport the US gave up inviting them to take part i wonder why!.

I got to see a Vulcan that was attached to the USAF at Offutt AFB in Bellevue (Omaha) Nebraska in 1973. It was an amazing plane.

I remember being awestruck by seeing a Vulcan flying at low level when I was on holiday during the sixties. It was around about the time that a Vulcan featured in the James Bond movie Thunderball, I was ten years old at the time but I can still remember just how low that aicraft was flying.

Went to the home of the Vulcan last weekend, Woodford, I’ve lived around the area all of my life and it’s been an ever present part of our lives, we’ve seen Vulcans, Nimrods, and a variety of BaE aircraft come and go. The Vulcan howl has been heard around here for years, we miss it. I took a photo of XM603 that’s sat at the Avro Museum as the sun went down on Sunday. Sadly the factory has gone, replaced with a faceless housing estate, the runway destroyed. I recommend reading Vulcan 607 by Rowland White.

If you cover this topic again, please include the sound of the Vulcan as it is as impressive as the sight of it. Plenty of us in the UK have footage from airshows before it was retired.

I have the privilege and honour of working at the factory that the AVRO Vulcan was built in.

During the Falklands War (here in brasil we call it Guerra das Malvinas) one Vulcan had to make an emergency landing in Rio de Janeiro. I remember the crowd going to the airport to see the bomber and its crew stranded, while the government decided what to do with them.

One of my favourite aircraft along with the EE Lightning. I feel privileged to have seen both flying.

I had the pleasure to see that beast fly on several occasions. The sound of its engines were particularly impressive on an eight year old. I continue to follow XH558.

The Vulcan is a hell of a thing to see in flight

The Vulcan is the plane which left me in awe the most of all I have seen flying myself. The scream and the thunder which sets of all car alarms in a mile radius, the steep bank angle and the rate of climb are insane for such a large air frame. However the beginning of the video is chronologically all over the place a bit. The 4 Avro 707 prototypes are what went before the first Vulcan, then the Vulcan B1 came, recognisable from its straight wing leading edges, the B1A having more powerful engines. The B2 model is the Vulcan as we know it today, it has the distinct kink in the wing leading edge, which was added to resolve some stability issues of the B1 and enlarge wing surface, again more powerful Avon engines were fitted, with the B2A having more thrust again. One of the 2 Avro 707A is preserved as well as several Vulcans, the 707 can be seen in the MOSI in Manchester, and for something built in 1949 it was quite space age.

The RAF Vulcan and our B-58 Hustler just looked like they were designed to inflict the " end of the world " scenario we all feared. Just a thought. ✌️

The Vulcan howl is excellent at setting off car alarms at air shows.

I was fortunate to be at an airshow in Guam, in 1978. There were were two Vulcan bombers. One flew. Helluva sight!

Saw the Vulcan at an air show in the Lake District. Sat in a little boat on the lake it was amazing how they threw that bomber around right overhead

In an optics course, the textbook introduction talked about the Vulcan. It has the radar cross section of a sparrow (They didn’t specify if it was African or European 😂). Though, the Brits denied that it was intended in the design.

When I was growing up in rural Oxfordshire, one summer, a Vulcan would regularly fly over our home, at low altitude, bound for Brize Norton and powered by what was to be Concorde’s engine, in test. Later, Concorde flew over, undercarriage down, on test flights. We had old sash windows, and I can still remember the frames rattling. There was a low-altitude military corridor overhead, with a number of RAF camps nearby, including Upper Heyford, so we were also treated to the occasional group of 6-or-so F4 Phantoms, and later F1-11’s.

In the late seventies my dad's lorry had a puncture near the end of i think Kirton Lindsay runway. it takes a while to change a HGV tyre and all the time Vulcans were doing circuits, the howl was impressive to say the least

When I was a kid I was allowed to climb inside a Vulcan parked on the verge during an air show - despite its size, as the video commented, the cabin space was not luxurious! It still had folding blackout curtains, to help reduce the intense glare of any nuclear explosion after dropping its ordnance. Despite the fact it was now decades old when I saw it, I still thought it looked magnificent - like the also delta-winged Concorde, it looked beautifully elegant, even sitting on the runway, let alone in the air. The fact this decades old design could travel 8000 miles to do a bombing run on the Falklands is a testament to her designers, as well as the tenacity and training of the crews and those who maintained them. Used to much smaller fighters, the sight of something like this soaring over Port Stanley must have been pretty intimidating to the Argentine garrison

The most important reason for the Falkland Islands conflict was the inhabitants wanted to remain a British colony. Thanks to Margaret Thatcher, they remain British subjects to this day. There is a 1 hr doc on YT about the way the Vulcan operation was successfully carried out. Worth watching!

The Brits can work magic with sheet metal. Nearly always gorgeous designs, it's sad what foreign ownership has done to their legacy automakers

Theres a Vulcan at the RAF Cosworth air museum. A cool exhibit as it was possible to go inside and sit at the rear operator's station and see the complexity of the systems they had to oversee.

You had to see a squadron scramble of vulcans to see the power and might of these amazing birds

i see the one that's been restored at an airshow... wow the noise of that i still feel vibrating through me nearly 20 years later

It is said that because of its rounded leading edge, lack of tailplane and blended wing-body design, the Vulcan had a very low radar cross section for an aircraft of that enormous size, and that it influenced the development of the Northrop B-2, which tried to achieve the low RCS on purpose that the Vulcan had by lucky chance.

An awesome aircraft that looked amazing. Another splendid memory for a country that can no longer build its own military aircraft. Where are the desendants of these great engineers that we once had?

One of my earliest memories is seeing a huge, delta winged jet flying off the coast of Cornwall. It seemed close enough to touch, and was probably at less than 300 ft. The noise was incredible. I remember seeing it turn on it's side and peel off out to sea. Was it a Vulcan or a Concorde? I can't remember. This would have been about 1970.

IMO if Great Britain had money like the US does, the Vulcan would be still flying like the B-52 is today. Like the B-52, the Basic design is solid

Don't forget the Vulcan howl was not the jet noise of the four Olympus, impressive as that was, but the unearthly intake noise under certain atmospheric conditions. Usually on the take off but sometimes at low altitude as full power was added. Perhaps mention should also be made of XH558 although retired was refurbished at considerable cost met entirely by public subscription such was the fondness for the Vulcan. Flew the display circuit for several years until it accrued considerable more flight hours of any other Vulcan and had to be retired but only after making publicised flight "tours" of the UK so as many as possible could get a 'last look' of one in the air.

Apparently an argentine soldier said of the Vulcan if that's the size of their aircraft , how big is their aircraft carrier

I attended Mildenhall air shows from 83 to around 96 and only two non-US displays made US service personnel stop and look up. The red arrows and the Vulcan.

I used to watch Vulcans flying over my town. They were majestic and just sorta hung in the air.

The Avro Vulcan and the Convair B-58 were delta wing bombers of the 50's-60's that never played a decisive role beyond nuclear deterence. At least the Vulcan got one conventional mission.

XV 770 was the used as a test bed by RR for different engines. It came to grieve at a Battle of Britain display, RAF Syerston 1958 when the wing suface peeled back and crashed at the end of the runway. I was there.

I watched one of the last flights of this bird at the Canadian International Air Show in Toronto in 1982. What a sight!!!!

The Vulcan Howl burns its way into your soul. It's a hell of a thing.

*INTERESTING FACT:* It was actually found years later that the second version Vulcan shape had a profile that gave it some stealth capability - this in a time before such a thing was being widely considered. The only thing that really prevented it from being fully stealth capable was that the upright rear tail was detectable by radar. That was part of the reason why during the nuclear exercises over the USA, no one could easily track all the Vulcan aircraft, even after they delivered their virtual payloads.

Heck of A howl, they used to fly over our house every year in the 80s when I was little ! Something else that plane !

I lived right under the flight path of the Vulcans from Waddington and Scampton until I was 17, and had a friend whose father was a Vulcan pilot. It was always exciting to have a meal with him, although he couldn't talk much about his work. After a few years, we because desensitised to the noise and didn't notice when a Vulc flew over. However, when we had visitors from other areas and a Vulcan flew over the house, they'd yell "WHAT THE H*CK IS THAT TERRIBLE NOISE????", to which we'd yell back in unison "WHAT TERRIBLE NOISE???". I stood right under the flight path of the last flight of XH558 over North Yorkshire. That brought back some memories.

They used to fly over my house usually very low when I was a kid. They were incredibly imposing, anyone out on the street had to stop and watch it especially since it was almost close enough for the pilot to give you a wave. This would have been in the 80s, towards the end of its service and it was like something from an alternate reality. Id like to think one of them was the one that went to the Falklands but of course I've no way of knowing, the pilots must have had the mother of all square backsides after that stunt!!!!

Don't forget the Vulcans managed to drop several nukes on the USA in 1961. Quite a few in fact, with no losses whatsoever. Oh yes, training nukes.. sorry, did I forget to say that. Yes, training nukes.

7:49 That's a Gloster Javelin...!!

I always thought the Vulcan 770 was a beautiful aircraft. From the underside, when it screamed overhead, it makes me think of Rodan, the Japanese kaiju, beautiful and deadly at the same time.

4:20 The straight leading edge was featured only on a few early airframes, namely the two prototypes VX770 and VX777, and a handful of the first pre-production airframes that were primarily to be used for testing, XA889, XA890, XA891, XA892 and XA893. The initial kinked wing, known as the Phase 2 wing, was retroactively fitted onto most of these (VX777, XA889, XA891, XA892 and XA893) which involved a straightforward replacement of the leading edge portion of the wing. Vulcan B1 from XA894 onwards universally had the Phase 2 wing when they were completed. It is important to note that this was not the Vulcan B1a (which was a later ECM upgrade as a stopgap measure to bring B1a up to B2 standard on that front) and Vulcans refitted as such carried the designation Vulcan B1. 7:39 That is a Vulcan B1. XA894 was the sixth production Vulcan and eighth built in total. It was used only for engine development until its destruction in an undo tainted engine failure on the ground, where thankfully no one was hurt.

I remember when the Falklands war started the British had to go to the Castle Air Museum in Atwater, Ca. to remove the conventional bomb sight from the Vulcan on display there. Seems since these were all converted to nuclear bombers, they didn't need one anymore and there were none available in the UK.

…and they made it loud as all hell Lol Also this shot at 4:48 has no right being this badass, it looks totally monochrome except for the red glow of the viewport reflecting off his face… looks like a music video or something

I had the honour to sit next to a former Vulcan crew member on a flight from Southampton . He even sent me photos of him and the crew

Such a beautiful aircraft

When Soviet SAMs prevented high overflights the V bombers went to low altitudes. The Victor and Valiant could not withstand the buffeting with fatigue fracture problems. Vulcans just kept on going.

Saw one of these in the 80s in Omaha NE airshow. Super cool

IMO a delta wing should never be confused with a relatively higher aspect ratio flying wing so an AVRO Vulcan can never be considered related to the B-2.

This is the coolest looking jet bomber ever made

Recollect seeing these and Victors on a base near Hong Kong when I was a child in the early 60’s. Love to know the name of the base. Amazing looking aircraft. Did Airfix ever produce models of the Vulcan, Victor and Valiant? Well ahead of the game.

Personally, I think the RAF should have bought mostly Vulcans for the _V Force_ , especially when it was found to be surprisingly suitable for low-level flying. And modernized them starting the late 1970's with a digital cockpit to reduce the crew to three, put in Rolls-Royce BR700 turbofans to replace the Olympus turbojets, and made it capable to carrying various types of stand-off weapons. That upgraded Vulcan could still be operational in 2023.

Don't tell us about the Vulcan howl without including a clip of that noise. That's like editing 101 bro.

The plane crash in which Chadwick died wasn't "mysterious", it was due to a servicing error on a pre-production aircraft.

We had one land at my base during the 1970s at Loring AFB in northern Maine. It was an amazing sight to behold. It had a high stance on the ground akin to the B-58 Hustler. I found out only the pilot & co-pilot had ejection seats,the crew went down with the bird !

Built only 7 years after ww2... the speed of aircraft development !

During preparation for the Black Buck operation they were having a hard time getting parts as they were becoming so obsolete. One part was being used as a cigarette tray in the crew room

So where is this distinct “Vulcan Howl”?

I saw one fly once lonnnnng ago at an airshow. Without a bomb load, it could fly shockingly slow without stalling. As in "Jets can't fly that slow" slow.

You forget the Canberra B2 !

Roy Chadwick's death wasn't mysterious. He was flying in the Avro Tudor airliner prototype when it crashed on take off due to a rigging error on the aileron cables. It was a simple screw up. Avro didn't plan 2 aircraft based on the original design. As data was gathered from wind tunnel testing and by the 707 test aircraft, the original design was modified as wing shape evolved and the wing tip fins were replaced by a single large central one. The production wing was modified again after the prototpye had flown to give it the distinctive kink to the leading edge, but there was only ever one aircraft being developed. You didn't mention it but the revised wing actually allowed the Vulcan to go supersonic, something it once proved 'inadvertently' although never formally cleared to do so. Something goes horribly wrong about 4 minutes in. The Vulcan was explicitly designed as a high-level bomber and that was the swept-wing delta that flew in 1952. It was never redesigned for a low-level high speed role. What actually happened was that the advent of SA-2 (thank you for the correct video) drove first a move to the Blue Steel stand-off missile and the B2 with more powerful engines and a better EW fit. Eventually the aircraft moved to a low-level role but they were the same delta wing design that had been on the drawing board since the end of the '40s. And they were never what you might describe as 'fast' jets. The 'Vulcan' at 7:50 is a Gloster Javelin fighter. Having been in the fortunate position of flying a Vulcan with 50 Sqn for a few circuits I have to say the visibility out the windows wasn't too bad and it was only cramped climbing into and out of the seat. Once you were there it was fine. The weapon at 9:37 is a Thor IRBM, nothing to do with the Vulcan and in fact withdrawn from service at the end of the '50s as the Vulcan's Blue Steel came into use. Black Buck 1 actually involved 15 Victor tanker sorties. By 1982 the Vulcan was by no means one of the most advanced weapon systems in the world. The outstanding achievent was that the raids were strategically and tactically successful despite the ancient equipment. The Vulcan lost the nuclear deterrent role a long time before the Falklands war, 1969 to be precise. The aircaft did continue to carry the WE177 free-fall nuke but it was no longer the primary deterrent platform. As you finish with a clip of it, it might have been worth mentioning that one of those K2 tankers was converted back to B2 status and continued as a display aircraft, first with the RAF and later as a private charity enterprise. It actually flew for the last time in 2015.

Mostly an enjoyable video. At 2:52(ish): "in a desperate bid to maintain a grip on global dominance". Hardly. Prior to WW2 the UK recognised that its Empire would have to go - the only question was when (it started to be dissolved right after the war). Unlike the USA which profiteered from WW2 and ended it far richer and stronger, the UK was technologically advanced but effectively bankrupted by it so no thoughts of dominance were present - merely having a nuclear deterrent and hence a voice. For example, the last WW2 Lend-Lease payment was made on Dec. 29th 2006. The UK atomic program came about because the USA showed itself to be an unreliable partner when it reneged on the "Quebec Agreement" and refused to share the nuclear technology developed in the USA by US, UK and Canadian and other Commonwealth scientists. As an aside, under that agreement the USA was required to ask for permission from the UK (joint permission was required) to use nuclear weapons on Japan, which it did and the UK granted permission - inevitably. Add to that the sneeringly insulting attitude adopted by the USA in 1946 (Sec. State Byrnes) towards the UK (Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin) that made it clear that the UK was merely an irritation to the USA and not a partner. Thus it was clear that the USA could not be relied upon to aid the UK - a trait which is still present in US politics with Trump saying he will take the USA out of NATO. The Vulcan was, perhaps accidentally, stealthy from some aspects in that its shape deflected radar signals away from the transmitter rather than back to the transmitter causing it to disappear from radar screens. This helped the UK conduct successful mock strike exercises against the USA which would have obliterated several East Coast cities had they been real.

Weird hearing Chakotay talking about Vulcans, not on Voyager.