Worcester Spitfire is safe and well – up north

The Spitfire fighter plane, which for more than a decade was a familiar landmark in Droitwich Road near the gates to Perdiswell Park is now tucked up safe from the elements in a musum in Glasgow.

It was spotted recently by former Worcestershire photo-journalist Jeremy Postle, who now lives in Devon, while on a work trip to the Clyde Submarine Base at Faslane.

“They used to call it ‘Worcester’s Spitfire’ – except it never really was,” said Mr Postle. “Spitfire LA198 flew with 602 (City of Glasgow) Auxiliary Squadron between 1944 and 1947.

“It’s a Mark F21 (with blunted wing tips, a Griffon engine and a five bladed propeller) which was developed towards the end of the war, in 1944.

“With engine trouble, it crashed on landing at Horsham St Faith, in July 1949 and was returned to Vickers Armstrong for repair.

“There’s some speculation surrounding whether or not it ever flew again, however, it was presented to Worcester’s Air Training Corps, in 1954.

“Controversially, it was borrowed back, and lent out for filming for the 1968 film release The Battle of Britain and sadly never returned.

“Between 1970 and 1989, it was ‘guarding the gates’ at RAF Locking and RAF Leuchars before returning to storage at RAF St Athan.

Happily, the engine was removed and given to an airworthy Spitfire belonging to the RAF’s Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, but the airframe remained in storage until it was taken off the MoD’s inventory and gifted to the City of Glasgow in 1997.

It finally returned to Glasgow in 1998 and spent five years undergoing restoration at the Museum of Flight in East Fortune.

“In 2005, with inches to spare and some extra strengthening to the building, it was suspended in the atrium at Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery, where it remains to this day.

“Back in the air, undercarriage down, looking as though she’s coming in to land – Glasgow’s Spitfire – better there than in storage, or even in the corner of some foreign field.”