Following last year’s visit by Guild artists to the Rolls-Royce Heritage Centre in Derby, the Rolls-Royce Heritage Flight very kindly hosted a follow on visit, this time to the R-R Flight Operations Centre at East Midlands Airport.
The Rolls-Royce Spitfire PR.XIX, PS853, is active on the airshow circuit and at the end of the flying season undergoes Winter maintenance. Thus, on the occasion of our visit (timed to enable viewing of the aircraft stripped down), the aircraft was on supports and minus its Griffon engine.
It was a real privilege to be given close up access to these aircraft. Our hosts for the day were Heritage Flight Chief Pilot, Mark Discombe, and Heritage Trust Lead, Jon Skelson.
On arrival, we gathered in a conference room for tea, coffee and notices before heading down to the hangar for the day’s work.
To round off the day, Robert presented Mark with a picture, ‘The Last Hurrah’, of PS853 in a previous guise.
Thanks go to Andy Roberts, Director of Flight Operations, Mark Discombe and Jon Skelson and their teams who made us so welcome and afforded us such privileged access to the aircraft. Thank you for the patches and tags!
Thank you also to all the artists themselves who supported the day and made it so worthwhile.

Richard Thorne AGAvA
Secretary