Flawed from the Start

Just down from where we stayed, was the Canadian Museum of Flight in Langley, it’s a small affair not too dissimilar to small air museums in the UK in as much as they are run by enthusiasts and due to their lack of funding and space everything is piled on top of each other. That’s not a bad thing, it’s just that you tend to jump from one thing to another because they are ordered that way because they fit together, and not because they are related. They also usually have an excellent selection of models which I decided it was a waste of time looking at as I didn’t see a model surviving my packing and luggage handlers.

This happens to be a Handley Page Hampden which I have never heard of, but it was replaced by more memorable aircraft, which is no surprise as it had some deficiencies, not least because of its size, which is noticeable when you stand next to it. The larger Halifax and Lancaster succeeded the Hampden and all had 4 engines instead of the Hampden’s 2.

This example ended up in the drink due to another one of the Hampden’s issues, this one is known and was stabilized yaw which essentially I believe is also known as a skid, which sounds good, but causes the air flow to cease over the wing, or airflow in the correct direction, which would cause a stall. In addition you could get the Hampden so sideways that the fuselage could block the airflow over the rudder. None of these known problems helped the pilot who got the aircraft out of shape too close to the ground/water. Despite this they were lucky to have been spotted and all 4 crew were recovered with minor injuries.

There were lots of exhibits to see, but I think my favorite was the Vampire, mainly because I have built a model, but the home made helicopter with a Honda Civic engine was pretty interesting.