It was a dry bright and sunny morning as we arrived at the Yorkshire Air Museum, Elvington on the outskirts of York, for the ‘We’ll meet Again’ celebration weekend which coincides with the 80^th Anniversary of the Victory in Europe celebrations.

From previous visits to this event over the years we have learned to get there early, it is one of the biggest events of the year for the museum and with the dry, warm, and sunny weather of late there will be a lot of visitors, true to form the good weather had brought families out in their hundreds.

After a visit to the Naafi for breakfast we headed back outside to mingle amongst the reenactors as well as visitors who dressed in period costume from the forties had come to celebrate the VE day celebrations at the museum.

During the Second Word war RAF Elvington was home to 77 Squadron (French) flying Handley Page Halifax bombers on operations over occupied Europe. In October 1945 the two French squadrons returned to France where they became part of the post-war French Air Force.

During the early 1960s, the Blackburn Aircraft Company at Brough (now BAe Systems) used the runway for test flying the prototype Buccaneer aircraft. The RAF Flying Training Schools at Church Fenton and Linton-on-Ouse also used the airfield as a Relief Landing Ground to practise circuits and landings. RAF Elvington was officially closed in March 1992. In June 1985, the Yorkshire Air Museum and Allied Air Forces Memorial was born and granted charitable status.

Today, families and visitors of all ages and nationalities came to the museum to celebrate and remember those war years, as well as look around the museum and the fine aircraft on show and to have a great day out. Many had come dressed in period costume for the occasion, and took part in the Forties Street Party. It was an amazing sight and if you let your imagine wander, you could be transported back to the early 40’s war years. 

Outside the Naafi, the Yorkshire based vintage singer ‘Paula Marie’ gave an excellent performance of wartime and vintage songs from that era to the attentive visitors who were singing along and enjoying the music in the sunshine. 

On the lawned areas, several groups of WW11 army re-enactors had set up camp and were giving demonstrations and lectures on the guns and equipment they would have carried during the war. Opposite the control tower were several open topped American jeeps, their crews also explaining their role and the equipment they carried.

The Handley Page Halifax Mk111 bomber was standing proud out in the morning sunshine on the apron in front of ‘T2 hanger’, and on the other side of the apron the Douglas Dakota IVC-47B first flown by the Americans in 1935. My favourite though   was the freshly painted Blackburn Buccaneer S2b XV168, an aircraft which I became very familiar with in the early 1970’s as a young apprentice working on the intake airframes.

Various other Cold War aircraft were outside along the apron including the huge Nimrod Mk2, XV250, alongside the Handley Page Victor XL231which is currently surrounded with scaffolding in preparation for a change of colour scheme reverting to its colours last used when it was deployed to the Ascension Islands during the 1982 Falkland conflict. The distinctive red and white colours of the Jet Provost T4 trainer, and Hawker Hunter stood side by side. Over on the other side of the apron stood the French Mirage, the Hunter training aircraft XL571 which came to Elvington in 1994 and painted in blue livery to represent the leading aircraft in the Blue Diamonds formation team. The team was based at Leconfield in the early 1960s. The big twin folding wings of the Fairey Gannet AEW.3 airborne early warning strike aircraft which entered service in 1960, not a pretty aircraft to look at with its twin propellers, but an effective hunter and strike aircraft.

Inside the T2 hanger were various other aircraft, including the Tucano training aircraft, and the Harrier GR3, and a vintage fire tender, as well as aircraft memorabilia and missiles. A stall was selling WW2 inspired clothing and merchandise and another retelling the story of allied POW’s based at Stalag Luft 111 and their role in the Great Escape. Just outside the hanger one of the Navy re-enactors was giving an informative and fascinating talk about de arming a war time bomb and the tools and procedures they used to safely make the bomb safe.

Outside the Naafi the VE day celebrations were taking place in glorious sunshine, with families enjoying a picnic surrounded with flags and bunting and regalia as was fitting for VE day on the 6^th June 1945 some 80 years ago, A most enjoyable and memorable day at the air museum.