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Poona Tempest Mystery!

Posted by Paul McMillan on Sun Nov 09, 2003 01:39:39 PM

Thanks to Dave McDonald I obtained a copy of the Poona Tempest's article in January 1975 issue of Aeroplane Monthly

This is quite interesting as it includes photos and information from a N Simms who took the pictures in Poona in February 1969

Now, we know that Doug Arnold recovered a bunch of Tempest aircraft circa 1979 from Poona and there have been suggestions that 'up to 6' others were buried on site
to increase rarity and prevent others recovering them.

I do not know if these rumours are true, however the AM article lists a bunch of aircraft (7) that were there in 1969 but were not recovered.... I list these below:

As an aside, both MW741 and MW758 are listed in the AM article as well and only 1 of these subsequently known about for sure..


The '7 Missing Tempests'

RAF IAF RAF Notes
Serial Serial Code

PR555 HA407 XL-Y
PR659 - XC-L
PR756 - EG-H
PR779 HA356 5R-D
PR834 HA603 XL-X Jagan has HA603 as MW793, Air Britain has both PR834 and MW793 as HA603!!
PR867 HA415 XL-?
PR901 HA465 XC-C

'In-Situ Aircraft ?'
IAF
Code
MW741 HA622 Q RAF code unknown in AM Article
Reported: Open storage, airfield decoy, Poona AB, India

MW848 HA623 IAF Museum, Pallan AB, New Dehli.


The 8 Recovered Aircraft

Info from: http://user.tninet.se/~ytm843e/today.htm

quote "may be up to 14 Tempest II's still stored in India"



MW758 HA580 M RAF code unknown in AM Article
Last reported stored in Sussex, UK
MW376 HA564 G-BSHW - Last reported stored in France
MW401 HA604 G-PEST - Tempest Two Ltd/Stored
MW404 HA557 Last reported stored in Sussex, UK
MW758 HA580 Last reported stored in Sussex, UK
MW763 HA586 G-TEMT - Tempest Two Ltd/Restoration to fly. Air Britain has HA554
MW810 HA591 Nelson Ezell, TX USA/Stored
PR536 HA457 Notes: RAF Museum, Hendon

Can anybody add anything else?


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