The Flickr Xv588 Image Generatr

RAF Leuchars, Fife, Scotland // February 1991
6760px x 4507px
Ref: A0049
aviation.gavtroon.com

Phantom FG.1 XV588 crashed on take off from Leuchars in May 1977. 20 years later she still languished on the fire dump at the Eastern end of the base by the beach. Just recognisable as a Phantom a this point.

This was the one and only time I made it to the beach at Leuchars to take pictures, hence uploading this less than perfect shot. I guess I was just too lazy in those days to make the effort :-(

The United Kingdom operated the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II as one of its principal combat aircraft from the 1960s to the early 1990s. The UK was the first export customer for the Phantom, which was ordered in the context of political and economic difficulties around indigenous British designs for the roles that it was eventually purchased to undertake. The Phantom was procured to serve both in the Fleet Air Arm and Royal Air Force in a number of different roles including air defence, close air support, low level strike and tactical reconnaissance.

Although assembled in the United States, the UK's Phantoms were a special batch built separately and containing a significant amount of British technology as a means of easing the pressure on the domestic aerospace industry as a result of the major project cancellations. Two individual variants were eventually built for the United Kingdom; the F-4K variant was designed from the outset as an air defence interceptor to be operated by the Fleet Air Arm from the Royal Navy's aircraft carriers, while the F-4M version was procured for the RAF to serve in the tactical strike and reconnaissance roles. In the mid-1980s, a third Phantom variant was obtained when a quantity of second-hand F-4J aircraft were purchased to augment the UK's air defences following the Falklands War.

The Phantom entered service with both the Fleet Air Arm and the RAF in 1969; while in the Royal Navy it had a secondary strike role in addition to its primary use for fleet air defence, in the RAF it was soon replaced in the strike role by other aircraft designed specifically for strike and close air support missions, and by the mid-1970s was transferred to become the UK's principal interceptor, a role in which it continued until the late 1980s.

(Text Wikipedia)

Status - 18 May 1977

Burnt out on the runway at Leuchars, Fife after an aborted take off due to engine failure. Both crew (Flg. Off. T. Newbyand Flt. Lt. Steve Riley) ejected. Allocated to ground instruction at Leuchars and later to Predannack