Calling aeroplane lovers. A rare occurrence is happening tonight in Cape Town. It’s time for the very first Shackleton bomber’s engine to be fired up. This is an event for one night only and it is happening at the Ysterplaat Air Force base. It’s time for the Shackleton Night Ground Run. The event is organised by the Friends of the SAAF museum.

Colonel Wood says, “It is the first time in history and would be the last time it will happen that the Shackleton Bomber will start up at night for the public to see.”

 

Calling aeroplane lovers. A rare occurrence is happening tonight in Cape Town

The time to arrive at the base is 6 pm. Parking attendants will show you where to park. They will also direct you to the entrance of the museum. Entrance is free, but according to the organiser,s a small donation would be appreciated. They will also have card machines there. There will also be vendors selling boeries and burgers. There will also be live music. Once everyone has arrived, people will be allowed to walk around the museum and eat and drink something.

Aeroplane-lovers, feel and witness the raw energy

At 6.45 pm, a tour will start to the museum hangars where you can spend your time, with around 13 aircraft and other displays. At around 7.20 pm, people will walk to the place where the Shackleton is. Organisers say if it is timed correctly, dusk will have fallen, and as the light fades, the nav lights will be switched on and the roar of the Griffon engines will catch your attention. The actual Ground Run will last about 20 minutes. Once shut shutdown has happened, everyone will move back to the main museum where there will be plenty of boeries and burgers for people to purchase.

“It’s way more than a display, it’s a symphony of steel, rivets, sound and sheer power of an engineering marvel with vibrant navigation lights, landing lights and exhaust heat plumes lighting up the sky.”

 

Logistics

After the event, the hangars will be opened for the public to view all the planes and helicopters.

“This is really going to be a spectacle which you do not want to miss and really is one for the books and for a bucket list tick.”

Meanwhile, a passionate volunteer at tonight’s event, Colonel Andrew Wood, says there aren’t any pilots to fly the plane and also, based on its age, it will never fly again. 

Colonel Wood added, “It’s taken them a very, very long time to get authorisation, get everything cleared and ready for the night.”

He concluded by saying that it has taken those involved years to obtain permission to start up the Shackleton at night, allowing the public to see it. 

An excerpt from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Avro Shackleton was a British long-range maritime patrol aircraft (MPA) which was used by the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the South African Air Force (SAAF). It was developed by Avro from their Lincoln bomber, which itself had been a development of the famous wartime Lancaster bomber. The Shackleton was developed during the late 1940s as part of Britain’s military response to the rapid expansion of the Soviet Navy, in particular its submarine force.

 “The atmosphere is going to be electric under the cover of darkness.”

Produced as the primary type equipping RAF Coastal Command, the Type 696, as it was initially designated, incorporated major elements of the Lincoln, as well as the Avro Tudor airliner. It was furnished with an extensive electronics suite in order to perform the anti-submarine warfare (ASW) mission, along with much-improved crew facilities due to the long mission times involved in patrol work. The type was named Shackleton, after the polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton.