Over the summer break I dropped in to see what was going on at Palmerston North airport. There was nothing to be seen anywhere so I decided to head over to nearby fielding. This proved to be very rewarding with lots of flying going on and to my amazement the P.56 made an appearance! Its early history is covered here.
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The Information that I have been able to put together for this wonderful aircraft is as follows:
PAC/F/226 • T Mk. 1 WW397 RAF BOC 20.9.54: last airworthy RAF Provost 69
RAF Coltishall: inst. airframe 69
(last RAF Provost flight, Shawbury-Halton 30.10.69)
RAF Halton: inst. airframe: 7.11.69/79
(del. to Halton ex RAF Shawbury 30.10.69)
Flt Lt M. J. Crymble, RAF Lynham . 78/79
(trucked to Lyneham 4.79 ex Halton for planned use as
gate guard but instead rest. to fly Lyneham, ff 28.5.83)
G-BKHP Flt Lt Michael J. Crymble, RAF Lyneham 26.8.82/93
(flew as RAF “WW397/N-E”)
op: Vintage Aircraft Team, Cranfield 91/92
Keith Clarke, Gosford NSW: shipped to Australia .93/94
VH-OIL Keith C. B. Clarke, Gosford NSW 13.7.94/02
(rest. Sydney-Bankstown 94, flew as RAF “WW397/N-E”)
ZK-SGN James Slade/ Old Stick & Rudder Co, Omaka . 02/08
(shipped in container to NZ .02, ff Omaka 15.11.02,
flew as RAF “WW387/N-E”, flew in Japanese WW2
scheme for airshows 04 as “WW397”, repainted 04
as camouflaged Sultan of Oman AF “WW397”)
ZK-PPP Robert Young, Fielding NZ, later Las Vegas NV 6.6.11/15
(shipped from NZ to USA, to be based Boulder City NV)
N397WW reg. res: Robert Young, Las Vegas NV 2.2.12
I can not find any detail between 2011 and 2017!
Zk-PPP Back in New Zealand with MPJ Wilson 3.12.17