Here is another piece of the jigsaw. When the Hunters were retired from Valley (1979 I think) they were put into deep storge at 5 MU, RAF Kemble. Following the Buccaneer fleet grounding in early February 1980 many T7s and F6s were then recovered from storage and delivered to RAF Honington and RAF Laarbruch for pilot currency. I had completed the Buccaneer OCU course 3 days before the Nellis accident and managed to get detached to 5MU to help with the airtests and deliveries (I had held there before the Bucc OCU and had bought the UTP, Mike Lawrance, many beers! A thread on stories from pilots who held there would be interesting!). My logbook shows that Mike and I airtested XL573 on 10 March 1980 and then I delivered it solo to Honington 2 days later. I remember nothing special about either sortie and there is no mention of a second airtest before delivery so I assume that it was in good shape after the first one. 208 Squadron then kindly flew me back to Kemble in XF995, the T8B now operated by HHA at Scampton.
I never flew XL573 again during my time on 208 Squadron (June 1980 - Dec 1984), either at Honington or Lossiemouth, and as the photograph posted was taken at Honington in August 1983 when the only Buccaneer unit was 237 OCU I suspect that it remained an OCU aircraft until the OCU disbanded and then it went to 12 Sqn. I cannot confirm if it was ever operated by the Laarbruch wing, but there were many 'RAF Germany liaison visits' from Honington to Laarbruch when it could have been seen parked at VAS.