I first saw a Vulcan flying when I was a kid growing up in the Welsh valleys which were a playground for the type then. I would love to see a Vulcan flying again but don't think I ever will for all the reasons stated above. As I understand it (from half remembered articles in the aviation press) the MoD beancounters deliberately picked XH558 cos she had relatively high fatigue times and therefore a finite time on the dispaly circuit in the hands of the RAF. Now these high fatigue times mean she has a very limited life on the display circuit even assuming that huge wads of cash are available to a) put her back together, b) retrain a few crews and work up a display routine, c) subsidise the first display season to get the airshow folks used to the awesome hire cost. I'd pay an extra fiver to go to an airshow that had the Vulcan flying but only once or twice a season.
How long is her display life going to be? I vaguely recall 8 years on a fairly limited training / display routine. As much as would like to see her fly again, I can't see people throwing the kind of money required into the intakes of those gloriously loud Olympii to end up with an asset worth peanuts at the end of it all. I wasn't surprised at the lack of interest from the LHF for all the above reasons...........
Edited to endorse BeauMan's comments on organised vandalism.
C'mon chaps, would you strip down a car if you didn't have the cash or general wherewithall to put it back together?? Or would you keep pottering around until you had saved your pennies. Or at least guaranteed that the CAA would allow it to fly at the nd of it all rather than just being "onside".