Aeroplane September 2017

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AEROPLANE SEPTEMBER 2017 http://www.aeroplanemonthly.com 17

HangarHangar Talk


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I


f ever there is a single
building which marks an
airfi eld’s character above all
others, it has to be the
aircraft hangar. Aerodromes
operate quite happily without
control towers or even tarmac
runways, but without hangars
providing shelter for the based
aircraft, they’re just not
airfi elds, are they? Even when
an airfi eld is no longer
operational, its hangars often
remain as a fi nal landmark and
monument.
It is good therefore to see
that these structures are
gaining increased recognition,
such as the Grade II-listed
Municipal Hangar at Shoreham
Airport, where restoration work
began last month. Built in
1935, to complement the
similarly stylish terminal
building, it is described by
Historic England as “bearing
witness to the phenomenal
growth of civil aviation in this
period, a pioneering and
audacious episode of
considerable historic interest.”
At the beginning of July,
Britain’s oldest surviving
aircraft hangars, the sheds

built in 1910 at Larkhill in
Wiltshire for the Bristol School
of Flying, echoed to the rasp
of a Le Rhône rotary engine
for the fi rst time in more than a
century when David Bremner
and Theo Willford swung the
propeller on their Bristol Scout
replica. Although the airfi eld is
now a housing estate, some of
the sheds remain as
storehouses for the Army. The
engine run was particularly

important historically, as the
prototype Scout fl ew for the
fi rst time from Larkhill in
February 1914, and no Bristol
Scout had been seen there
since.
Another place to go is
nearby Old Sarum, where the
equally historic ‘Belfast truss’
hangars with their intricate
wooden roof designs house
both locally based aircraft and
the Boscombe Down Aviation

Collection. Further afi eld,
additional structures of the
period face a less secure
future ‘thanks’ to the vagaries
of the Defence Infrastructure
Organisation.
Sadly, no-one knows the
long-term future of the unique
collection of Belfast truss
hangars at RAF Henlow, or the
unique ex-Royal Naval Air
Service hangar which was
re-erected when, in 1917, the

Royal Flying Corps moved its
air mechanics school from
Farnborough to Halton in
Buckinghamshire. The airfi eld,
the school workshops built by
German PoWs, and the
adjacent World War One
training trenches where ‘erks’
were ‘hardened off’ before
being sent to the Western
Front, are all threatened by
MoD disposal plans. Adding
insult to injury, many ‘based’

aircraft have recently been
evicted from Halton’s hangars
to allow the MoD’s estates
division to use them for
storing domestic appliances
such as washing machines. Ye
gods, what fools we are!
But for me, Britain’s most
historic aviation buildings
must be the Cardington
airship hangars. The two
immense structures, which
once accommodated the
Royal Airship Works, dominate
the Bedfordshire skyline and
this year celebrate their
centenary.
The Cardington sheds are
true cathedrals to aviation,
measuring 689ft in length,
180ft in width and 157ft to the
apex of their corrugated roofs.
To give an impression of the
immense scale of the
buildings, the liner RMS Titanic
would have fi tted into either
shed with just 39ft of her stern
protruding.
The R101’s crash en route to
India in October 1934 sealed
the fate of the Royal Airship
Works and British airship
development. Cardington’s
sheds, though, still had a role
to play. During 1936 they
became the centre of
production for the thousands
of barrage balloons that
protected locations from
low-level attack, while in the
time of National Service
Cardington was the reception
unit where thousands of RAF
recruits went to be issued with
their kit.
Today, Cardington’s Number
1 shed is home to the
revolutionary Hybrid Air
Vehicles design, which
combines aerodynamic and
lighter-than-air technology to
generate lift. The proof-of-
concept Airlander 10 is, at
301ft in length, the largest
aircraft currently fl ying in the
world today, yet it is less than
half the length of the inter-war
behemoths. It fi ts into Shed 1
with ease. Happy 100th
birthday, Cardington. ■

STEVE SLATER


Comment on historic aviation
by the chief executive of the
UK’s Light Aircraft Association

The Bristol Scout reproduction with its tail in the historic Larkhill hangar this July. DIETMAR MORLEY

At the beginning of July, Britain’s oldest
surviving aircraft hangars, the sheds built in 1910
at Larkhill, echoed to the rasp of a Le Rhône
rotary for the fi rst time in more than a century

17_AM_HANGARTALK_Sept17_cc C.indd 17 31/07/2017 10:

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