Thunder & Lightnings

Fairey Gannet - Survivor WN411

AS.1 WN411 - Privately owned, Southampton, Hampshire

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Gannet AS.1 WN411 at Southampton, December 1988; Alan Allen

Hiding in a garden and doing a passable imitation of a garden shed extension, the remains of WN411 are looking rather pitiful. This aircraft was discovered in component form in a scrapyard by a national newspaper in 1982 - the Falklands War was raging and the MoD had started a desperate search for airworthy examples of the type to be used for AEW - a capability the RN had lost with the retirement of their large carriers and their fixed wing aircraft. The newspaper found WN411 still in packing cases along with several engines but as an AS.1 it was useless for the AEW task anyway. The war ended before any plan of restoring a Gannet to airworthiness got anywhere, and the AEW Sea King was created instead.

If you have any information on the current status of this cockpit section and/or a recent photo of it then please get in touch...!

Information on this page current as of 10/07/2021, last updated by Jake

Find other photos of WN411 on the following sites:

Air-Britain - Airliners.net - Airplane-Pictures.net - flickr.com - WorldAirPics.com - JetPhotos.net - PlanePictures.net