Mosquito RS712 Detail
RS712, a B.Mk35, was built by Airspeed at Christchurch. Following storage with the RAF, it was delivered to Sywell on 30th November 1951 for conversion to a TT.Mk35 by Brooklands Aviation. The conversion was completed in May 1952 and the aircraft was delivered to 27 MU at Shawbury for storage until issued to 1 CAACU at Hornchurch on 31st December 1953. With the closure of this unit, the aircraft was once again put into storage until 28th February 1958, when it was allocated to the 2nd Tactical Airforce and entered service with the TT flight of the Armament Practice Section at Schleswigland, northwest Germany.

The aircraft returned to the UK and was delivered to 3 CAACU at Exeter on 29th April 1958. RS712 was transferred to Flying Training Command at the end of June 1961 and was then retired to 27 MU, from where it was bought by Mirisch Films as G-ASKB on 31st July 1961. Camouflaged, and with dummy machine guns attached to the nose, it became one of the stars of 633 Squadron and the later Mosquito Squadron, both made at Bovingdon.

With its filming career over, RS712 was bought for the Strathallan Museum in September 1972, and flown there on 8th November 1975. The closure of the collection forced the sale of RS712, which was acquired by Kermit Weeks of Florida in June 1981 for the sum of £100,000. Harry Robins took over the task of returning RS712 to airworthiness in 1984, and he and George Aird flew the Mosquito to Booker airfield on 21st December and into the care of Personal Plane Services. Following further work by Harry, in 1986 RS712 was camouflaged and given the code EG-F to represent the 487 Squadron Mosquito flown by Group Captain P.C.Pickard during the attack on Amiens prison in 1944. On 29th September George Aird with George Stewart as co-pilot took off from RAF Benson for the first leg of the trip to Prestwick. Initially joined by RR299 near its Hawarden base for a formation photo session, twenty five and a half hours flying time saw RS712 delivered to Kermit's museum in Florida.

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