This civilian reader has enjoyed your correspondence immensely, being old enough to remember the chilling undercurrents of those Cold War years. Don't you find people these days have forgotten quite what a threat we all lived under back then? And young people these days probably couldn't even grasp the real possibility for us then of being melted three times over.
It all came back while I was watching a Discovery Channel cable TV prog about the V bombers just yesterday evening. There was some excellent footage of Val, Vic and Vul. There were also intelligent remarks about what the Vulcan crews might have thought about their return-home routes.
I lived near Coningsby in the eighties when a young family man, and went to the Coningsby Air Show in 1984 or1985 (I don't recall exactly which), with my wife and young kids. A Vulcan did a display. It was quite unforgettable. The ground shook noticeably!
(Is the 'driver' out there somewhere?) It must have left a big impression on my then two year old daughter; she has a place at Cranners next year, to fly.