Chance to see two Lancasters flying in formation over the English countryside will certainly be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Canada’s WWII Lancaster bomber will soon be heading across the Atlantic to join the only other airworthy plane of its kind for a series of special flights over the U.K. As planned, the only two Lancaster bombers still flying will come together in August as a “special salute” to all the veterans of Bomber Command.
The Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum in Hamilton revealed Monday that it plans to fly its vintage Avro Lancaster to England in August. Together with the Royal Air Force’s Battle of Britain Memorial Flight (BBMF) Lancaster, it will be involved in a month-long flying tour in the U.K. before returning home to Hamilton in September.
The Avro Lancaster is one of World War Two’s most-recognisable British aircraft. It is most famous as the aircraft involved in the Dambuster raids, which saw 19 Lancasters attack German dams with Sir Barnes Wallis’s “bouncing bombs” in 1943. A total of 55,573 airmen of Bomber Command died in WWII. Their average age was 22.
