JV482

JV482 is an FM-1 Wildcat, the version with folding wings and four guns rather than six. In Fleet Air Arm service it was a Wildcat V, previously called the Martlet V. It flew with 882 Naval Air Squadron from RAF Long Kesh, coded 6C.

On Christmas Eve 1944 its engine caught fire on the way to dive-bombing practice over Lough Neagh. The 19-year-old pilot, Sub-Lieutenant Peter Lock, ditched in Portmore Lough, Co Antrim. He survived and lived into his eighties. The wreck stayed in the mud at the edge of the lough for almost 40 years.

In 1983 and 1984 the Ulster Aviation Society recovered it, helped by the Ulster Sub Aqua Club, the Heyn Group of Belfast and others. An Army Air Corps Lynx lifted the airframe out on 30 April 1984. It went first to the society's base at Langford Lodge.

Restoration has taken decades. The society says original design data has never been released, so volunteers have worked out drawings for themselves. The 882 Squadron markings went on in August 2017. In May 2022 the starboard wing was attached for the first time in some thirty years. New fuselage panels have been made, and work continues on the starboard stub wing.

It is the collection's only Second World War aircraft, and it now sits on the airfield it flew from in 1944.

Under restoration in Hangar 2 at Maze Long Kesh, painted in 882 Squadron markings. You can see the work in progress.