A Glance Back - How it used to be - Edition 1

I have been photographing aircraft for quite a while. Many of you reading this will have been also – some for longer and some, perhaps, more recently.

I don’t know about you, where you, the reader are, but for me the skies are not as busy as they were. Probably less military flying, fewer exercises and the air shows and air events have been cancelled. Wholly understandable but leaving a sense of something missing.

To help, I turned to some of my old photos and slides, many of which I hadn’t looked at in ages and it has been really good to see images from years ago – of types no longer seen in service or markings no longer worn. It has stirred memories of many days out at air shows, travelling around the bases in East Anglia, occasional trips abroad and base tours. I expect many readers will have similar memories; many will have been to the same events, the same bases and at similar times. Strange how so many familiar faces used to be seen, as you sped from one base to another during another “Elder Forest” or “Elder Joust” or similar!

The images that follow are in no particular order. No dates, types or serials. Just a collection of images, many of which will I hope stir your memory. “I was at that show.” “Yes, I had a tour there.” “Must get my old photos out.” Partly because they are digitised images from the seventies, eighties and nineties and partly because the early photographic equipment was not brilliant (nor the photographer then or now), I hope you will bear with the quality not being what you are used to on the major part of this Aviation Reporting website.

This is the first ‘How it used to be’, others will follow. No text then, other than the titles 2, 3 etc. I hope that you enjoy them, that they give you some pleasure during these quieter months …… and I’ll see you out and about at one aviation event or another, when the opportunity arises! With best wishes to all our readers and viewers around the world.

Author & photographer

Peter Nelson