Handley Page Victor
Links, References & Credits
Links
- Handley Page Victor at Greg Goebels' Air Vectors site.
References - Books
An excellent and riveting account of the first Black Buck mission to bomb the runway at Port Stanley during the Falklands War in 1982, which of course involved far more Victors than Vulcans! The author has clearly put a great deal of effort into his research, but has not produced the sort of dry technical account that so many would in his place - instead, it reads almost like a novel at times. The mission is covered right from the Argentine invasion through all the preparations to the flight itself, with all sorts of fascinating detail thrown in along the way. Thoroughly recommended.
V-Force - The History of Britain's Airborne Deterrent by Andrew Brookes
ISBN 978-0710602381
Buy from Amazon UK
A good book on the entire V-force with some Victor coverage, though some errors are evident.
References - Magazines
- Aircraft Illustrated, September 1986: part 1 of Peter R. Foster's Victor Force article; development and service history with some black and white pictures. Part 2 is presumably in the October issue - I haven't got it.
- AIR Pictorial, May 1972: part 1 of an excellent two part article by Elfan ap Rees.
- AIR Pictorial, June 1972: part 2 of an excellent two part article by Elfan ap Rees.
- Aeroplane Monthly, January 1981: part 1 of Bill Gunston's Handley Page Victor article; covering development history up to the initial B.1 order with several black and white pictures of the prototypes.
- Aeroplane Monthly, February 1981: part 2 of Bill Gunston's Handley Page Victor article; covering further development hisotry up to the tanker variants with several black and white pictures of B.1s.
- Aeroplane Monthly, March 1981: part 3 of Bill Gunston's Handley Page Victor article; concluding history to 1981, mostly on the Mk.2 variants with several black and white and some colour pictures. As with the other two parts does contain some inaccuracies.
- Combat Aircraft April/May 1997: Victors In The Sun - photo feature on Victors on deployment to America; a selection of nice colour pictures and variant roundup.
- Flying Review International, May 1968 (Volume 23 No 5): The RAF at Fifty - includes a brief article on the V-force and plans for the Victor bomber variants to be retired.
- Scale Aircraft Modelling, April 1997 (Volume 19 No 2): Aircraft In Detail - Photo Reconnaissance; article includes a few pictures of the Victor SR.2 (beautiful picture on the front cover) and a single colour profile.
- Scale Models International, October 1991: Desert Storm Victors; Andy Evans' article recording the great nose art of the Operation Granby Victors with several colour pictures and a decal roundup.
- Take Off numbers 15, 16 and 17: The V-Bomber story - a three-part article on the V-bombers, including much coverage of Victor operations and some good pictures, including a Victor three-view and variant roundup in number 16.
Credits
This section would have been greatly the poorer without contributions from the following - so many thanks to (in
alphabetical order):
Cliff Aldred, Allan Barley, Nick Challoner, Dick Clements (RIP), Ray Deacon, Susan Hopkins, Rick Kent, Ray Funnell,
Garry Lakin, Bob Lawson, Tom Muir, Vaughn E. Nelson, Chris Potter, Vladimir Stanojevic, Alex Walton, Graham Waterfield
and Rodney Williams.
Thanks also to the following organisations:
Gatwick Aviation Museum, RAF Manston History Museum and RAF Marham.
Visitor Comments
3 people have commented on this page. This is comment section 1 of 1.
Allan Wrigglesworth from Gloucester
Posted at 1:43pm on Sunday, May 9th, 2010
Peter is quite correct, XH648 was the last Victor delivered to 57Sqn at Honington. In the Memories section of the Victor site, I recall how, due to its rather fast taxying, I marshalled it onto the grass adjacent to the Pan. No damage, just my shame !!!
Jimmy James from Fakenham
Posted at 8:19pm on Sunday, March 8th, 2009
Peter, I was on 55 Sqdn and 648 was on our charge then. I think it moved to 57 (the enemy!)toward the end of 66 early 67, Cheers, Jimmy
Peter Chappelle from Abingdon, Oxon
Posted at 8:11pm on Sunday, March 1st, 2009
Good to hear that 648 is at last being restored. Bit baffled by the history as printed. I am sure that 648 was a 57 Sqn aircraft in 1966.
Peter. Ex ASC Victor B1A (K)