Princess Margaret & RAF Andover in USA 1965

[Warmtoast]

Watching the program on the box two nights ago about Princess Margaret's life. It showed her and her husband Anthony Armstrong Jones travelling around the USA in a RAF Andover with a prominent red tail.
Was the Andover based in the USA (Air Attaché's perhaps), or was it from the Queen's Flight and sent out specially to the USA for Margaret's use?

[chevvron]

Red tail sounds to me like TQF.

[evansb]

In 1965, Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon flew from the U.K. to the U.S.A. on a B.O.A.C VC-10. The Royal Couple toured the U.S.A. on The Queen's Flight HS-748 CC2 Andover XS789, one of three Andovers of The Queen's Flight. Andover XS789 was taken on strength in 1964.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1200x675/rblpn5x_22195984634da05a432b58545b76db517047b23e.jpg

Photo taken in 1965 at Davis-Monthan AFB, Tucson, Arizona.

[Warmtoast]

evansb
Queen's Flight HS-748 CC2 Andover XS789
That's it - TVM!
WT

[India Four Two]

Note the polished fuselage. I saw one up close at Binbrook in 1967. It looked like it was chrome-plated. I wonder how many "polishing techs" were on TQF?

[evansb]

The polished aluminium does indeed require constant maintenance.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1200x1556/64qk5cr_2e3f6e6993a72d2e2d42989ec2677d30e06dc69a.jpg

[chevvron]

At Benson, they used to taxy them almost into the hangar rather than leave them parked outside gathering bird excrement.

[Krystal n chips]

Note the polished fuselage. I saw one up close at Binbrook in 1967. It looked like it was chrome-plated. I wonder how many "polishing techs" were on TQF?

One of my entry was posted as a newly fledged J/T straight to TQF....when I met him again a few years later, it transpired most of his newly acquired technical expertise was spent on......polishing . He was not "overly enthused " as to his tour.

[Warmtoast]

Highly polished RAF aircraft for VIPs to travel in seemed to be the norm in those days as I witnessed at RAF Benson on Saturday 29th August 1959 when President Eisenhower who was on a visit to the UK for talks with prime minister Harold Macmillan flew up to Scotland to see the Queen and rather than flying in Air Force One (or whatever it was called in those days), he was flown to Aberdeen and back by an RAF Comet of 216 Sqn. seen here as it arrived at Benson on return from Aberdeen.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/669x468/ike1a_9ea73bbdf3b76cf0b1a2d65fb7dfd3ba4deb065a.jpg
...look at that bulled-up shiny finish!

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/683x552/ike_2a_6fd03c429deed899c9ff5e7fa6f06ac10364c069.jpg

[chevvron]

Highly polished RAF aircraft for VIPs to travel in seemed to be the norm in those days as I witnessed at RAF Benson on Saturday 29th August 1959 when President Eisenhower who was on a visit to the UK for talks with prime minister Harold Macmillan flew up to Scotland to see the Queen and rather than flying in Air Force One (or whatever it was called in those days), he was flown to Aberdeen and back by an RAF Comet of 216 Sqn. seen here as it arrived at Benson on return from Aberdeen.


According to Wiki, AF1 in 1959 was a Connie, so it was a case on one-upmanship. 707s didn't enter the fleet until the early '60s apparently and in any case might have been a bit 'marginal' on Aberdeen's 6,000ft runway.(Still RAF Dyce in those days wasn't it?)

[megan]

Recall reading that all that polishing was rather detrimental to the skin in the long term, as the skin was abraded away to a less than desirable thinness.

[Georgeablelovehowindia]

Well, for once I haven't had to turn the house upside-down in a vain and frustrating attempt, because I located the box of slides within seconds. I was actually at Dyce that day and the poor quality Kodachrome transparency shows a tiny figure - Ike - disembarking from a Comet with the fin number 715.

[Warmtoast]

Well, for once I haven't had to turn the house upside-down in a vain and frustrating attempt, because I located the box of slides within seconds. I was actually at Dyce that day and the poor quality Kodachrome transparency shows a tiny figure - Ike - disembarking from a Comet with the fin number 715.

Yes it was XK715.

I'd visited the National Archives at Kew and from the squadron ORB gleaned these details of Ike's Comet flight way back then.

Comet XK 715
Flight No. Spec 1416

Crew:
S/Ldr P. E. Pullen
F/O J. Byrne
F/S D. Rance
F/S J. Hayley
M. Eng J. Clark
Sgt M.C. Wendler
Sgt (W) M. Wood

Routing:
27th August 1959 Lyneham — LHR 1600 - 1620
28th August 1959 LHR — Dyce (Aberdeen) 0845 - 1005
29th August 1959 Dyce — Benson 1045 - 1205
29th August 1959 Benson — Lyneham 1305 - 1400