In the early '60s I was running Edinburgh UAS at RAF Turnhouse. BEA were operating the Vanguard between Turnhouse and Heathrow. The runway was still only about 6,000 ft and crosswinds were frequently limiting. They ran a midnight flight from Turnhouse, intended mainly for the mail and newspapers, but they offered cheap passenger tickets and it was nearly always full, and heavy.
After a particularly stormy winter's night, I rolled up at our hangar in the morning to find all our "Chippies" had been pushed up to one end to make room for the front end of a Vanguard. I had never seen such a shambles in an aircraft that had landed safely. It had taken a whole flock of seagulls at somewhere near V1. The radome was virtually demolished, windscreens smeared with blood, feathers and guts, and the leading edges of wings etc looked like a cheesegrater.
I believe one engine had been lost on impact, and fire warnings illuminated on a second. The captain elected to hang onto that engine until at safety height and established in the ILS pattern, then shut it down. Cloudbase was about 200ft with driving rain and a stonking great crosswind component. He made reassuring noises to the passengers in best BA tradition and set up the ILS approach. Story has it he got a third engine fire warning near the inner marker.
I phoned BEA and asked them if there was any chance the captain could come down to our crew room for "coffee" and tell the stus all about it, but they wanted to keep the whole thing under wraps. There was a short paragraph in a local paper describing what seemed a perfectly routine incident! I often wonder whether the chap got the reward/award he so well deserved for a superb piece of flying and airmanship. As for the Vanguard - well, they always said that when Vickers built anything it stayed built! Perhaps BEagle could confirm?