When I read Jill Hamel's piece in Digging into History I winced at the account of her transport to the Chatham Islands. The account has now been repeated in Peter Gathercole's review of the volume: "... when Jill Hamel flew in 1976 to the Chatham Islands, 500 miles east of Christchurch, in a 1939-45 converted Anson troop glider, fitted with an engine, that vibrated each of its 10 000 rivets..."

As this now risks becoming an archaeological myth - to put the record straight:

In 1976 the service to the Chatham Island was via SAFE Bristol Freighters. These were a late-war design - though with borrowings from a pre-war Bombay Bomber. Though they were not the only aircraft so described, a New Zealand description of them was "40 thousand rivets flying in formation" a reference to the vibration set up by their twin engines.. An Anson was a WW2 aircraft, but powered, not a glider and was used for training, liaison and maritime surveillance. Strangely there was a transport plane derived from an assault glider but it was not the Bristol Freighter.

Bristol B170, Bristol Freighter - flown by SAFE to the Chathams.
Bristol Bombay - a pre-war bomber from which the Freighter was derived.
General Aviation Hamilcar assault glider - equally unlovely but unrelated.
Blackburn Beverley - derived from the Hamilcar, but never flew to the Chathams.
Avro Anson - no relation at all.

Your aircraft obsessive editor.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006