K.2 XL190 at Manston, 1st September 2001; author	K.2 XL191 at Newbury, 1987; Rodney Williams

XL190 sat at RAF St. Mawgan for many years after retirement and was put up for auction in February 1998. Bought by the Imperial Aviation Group, supposedly for a full restoration to at least ground-running condition, when the directors of the group were arrested for fraud, the sale collapsed. In January 1999 the aircraft was bought by the scrappers, and in mid January the task of scrapping her began. Thankfully the nose at least has been saved and is now at the museum at Manston in Kent. Contrary to previous reports, my visit found her to be in surprisingly good condition, with restoration proceeding nicely. The cockpit had not suffered anywhere near as badly as I had been led to believe, and while missing many instruments could never be described as 'gutted'. Now permanently under cover, the future is certainly looking bright for this nose section. Information current as of 01/09/2001.

Walter Soplata, at Newbury, Ohio, has the stripped-out cockpit section of a Victor K.2, XL191, late of 55 Sqn. This was the machine that crash-landed short of the runway at Mt.Hope (Hamilton), Ontario, on arrival in wretched weather for the Hamilton airshow in June 1986. Most of the airframe was scrapped after spares removal, but the shell of the nose and two ejection seats were left with the Canadian Warplane Heritage for possible display. In those days CWH didn't collect things as modern as the Victor, so they offered the nose for sale; it looked likely to be scrapped but was instead bought by Mr Soplata and hauled back to Ohio in Spring 1987. Information current as of 03/1987.

K.2 XM717 at Hendon, 8th March 2003; author

The RAF Museum at Hendon completed their trio of V-Bombers in 1997 with the addition of this Victor nose. Lucky Lou has lived up to her name and thankfully avoided the vandalism meted out to Cosford's Vulcan nose (XA893), XM717 is instead beautifully presented with perspex guards to stop any light-fingered visitors and some panels on the starboard side replaced with perspex so you can see inside - e.g. the radar bay. She also represents the inflight refuelling force, with a drogue firmly attached to the refuelling probe and the fuel line extending up into the rafters. The name Lucky Lou referred to the wife of Crew Chief Geoff Shilton - his name is still on the crew door! Information current as of 08/03/2003.