So what do you choose to believe?
On the one hand, "it will never fly again" stories have become a standard part of XH558 winter fundraising activities in recent years.
On the other, this does have a slightly different tone to past messages, so it may be more real: and it does come on the heels of the mangling of two engines at Finningley, which inevitably raised doubts about the future.
On the third (did they say it was only metallurgists who had three hands?) PPRuNe is the place to go if you want to find negative views about XH558: from, perhaps, what you might expect to be the best informed community on the subject anywhere.
So what do you choose to believe?
I've now seen XH558 do her stuff half a dozen times since 2008, at East Fortune and Leuchars. Four memories stick with me.
One is that unique engine tone as the power is increased. A throwback to witnessing a mass Vulcan takeoff at a Finningley Airshow in (I think) the very early 70s. The second was a roll off the top of a takeoff at Leuchars in 2009.
The third was at the press day at Leuchars in, I think, 2008: the look on the face of a Dutch F16 pilot as he saw a shape he'd never seen flying before.
And the fourth was at this year's perfect Leuchars Air Show, with a nearly three year old grandson who still tells me that the "Vulcan was very loud"; only he makes it sound like "falcon".
I suppose, at least, that young Alistair will always remember that he did see the Vulcan flying when he was small.