The types
English Electric aircraft you can see
| Type | First flew | Built | UK museums |
|---|---|---|---|
| English Electric Wren | 1923 | 3 | 1 |
| English Electric CanberraB.2–PR.9 & T.4 | 1949 | 1,352 + 403 licence | 32 |
| English Electric LightningF.1A–F.6 | 1954 | 337 | 25 |
The firm
English Electric in brief
In the Second World War it built Handley Page Hampdens and Halifaxes under licence. W.E.W. Petter joined from Westland in December 1944 and formed a design team. The team set up flight test and assembly at Warton, Lancashire, in 1948, with production at Samlesbury. Their Canberra jet bomber first flew on 13 May 1949, with Roland Beamont at the controls. The supersonic Lightning followed.
In 1960 the aviation arm joined Vickers, Bristol and Hunting to form the British Aircraft Corporation. The parent group merged with GEC in 1968, and the English Electric name was dropped.
Where to go
Museums holding English Electric aircraft
| Museum | English Electric types | Adult entry | Airframes | Headline exhibit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boscombe Down Aviation CollectionSalisbury, Wiltshire | 2 | £13.50 | 49 | The Lancaster cockpit reproduction tour, and a test-and-evaluation pedigree collection you can physically inhabit rather than admire… |
| Bournemouth Aviation MuseumChristchurch, Dorset | 2 | £10 | 29 | The sit-anywhere policy itself — one entry fee, no per-cockpit charges, a full BAC 1-11 flight-deck sim in a shed, and thousands… |
| City of Norwich Aviation MuseumNorwich, Norfolk | 2 | £9 | 33 | City of Norwich Aviation Museum at Horsham St Faith: Norfolk's largest, ~30 airframes including a Vulcan and Nimrod with bookable… |
| East Midlands AeroparkDerby, Leicestershire | 2 | £5 | 35 | East Midlands Aeropark: a Vulcan, Nimrod R1 and Buccaneer parked on grassy mounds overlooking EMA's runway — half museum, half premier… |
| Farnborough Air Sciences Trust MuseumFarnborough, Hampshire | 2 | Free | 16 | FAST at Farnborough guards the birthplace of British aviation science — Cody, the RAE, wind tunnels — with sit-in Harrier, Puma and Lynx… |
| Gatwick Aviation MuseumGatwick, Surrey | 2 | £12.50 | 16 | Avro Shackleton WR982 (the £5 guided tour is unanimously endorsed) and a live-engined English Electric Lightning. There's also… |
| Midland Air MuseumCoventry, Warwickshire | 2 | £11 | 66 | Vulcan XL360 with cockpit access and volunteer-led tours (ask for the instrumentation talk), plus the Whittle jet heritage collection a… |
| MorayviaForres, Moray | 2 | £8 | 35 | Nimrod XV244 (complete, and the crew who operated her sometimes give the tours) alongside a Sea King in RAF SAR yellow — the machine that… |
| National Museum Of FlightNorth Berwick, East Lothian | 2 | £15 | 47 | Concorde G-BOAA, which flew British Airways' first commercial supersonic service in 1976 and arrived here by barge and giant road-crawl… |
| Newark Air MuseumNewark, Nottinghamshire | 2 | £12.50 | 95 | Vulcan XM594, with cockpit tours occasionally given by former Vulcan aircrew, which reviewers describe with the reverence normally… |
| Norfolk and Suffolk Aviation MuseumBungay, Suffolk | 2 | £10 | 65 | Depends who you ask — the joy is the oddities. Come for the Bloodhound missiles and decoy rarities; stay for volunteer flight-simulator… |
| North East Land, Sea and Air MuseumsSunderland, Tyne and Wear | 2 | £7.50 | 46 | NELSAM in Sunderland mixes Vulcan XL319 (flew in when the airport still existed), a Pucará from the Falklands, trams, buses and a… |
| RAF Manston History MuseumRamsgate, Kent | 2 | £7 | 22 | RAF Manston's history museum spans 1916 RNAS days to Cold War Meteors, with strong 1940s room-sets — and it sits next door to the… |
| Robertsbridge Aviation SocietyRobertsbridge, East Sussex | 2 | Free | 6 | Robertsbridge Aviation Society — a village-hall-sized museum of recovered WWII relics and six jet cockpit sections, curated with… |
| Royal Air Force Museum LondonLondon, Greater London | 2 | Free | 88 | Avro Lancaster R5868 'S-Sugar' — 137 operations, the RAF's highest-scoring surviving heavy — under the same roof as a Vulcan, a… |
| Royal Air Force Museum MidlandsShifnal, Shropshire | 2 | Free | 78 | TSR-2 XR220, one of two survivors of the most gifted aircraft Britain ever cancelled, sharing floor space with the stainless-steel… |
| Solway Aviation MuseumCrosby on Eden, Cumbria | 2 | £8 | 21 | Vulcan XJ823 with pre-bookable crew-compartment visits; a Phantom, Lightning and Canberra (whose three-crew cockpit reviewers describe as… |
| South Yorkshire Aircraft MuseumDoncaster, South Yorkshire | 2 | £7.50 | 109 | Doncaster's South Yorkshire Aircraft Museum sprawls across the old RAF Doncaster site: dozens of airframes and helicopters, strong… |
| Tangmere Military Aviation MuseumChichester, West Sussex | 2 | £15 | 23 | Hawker Hunter WB188 in one-off scarlet, in which Neville Duke took the world air speed record to 727.63 mph off this coast in 1953;… |
| Yorkshire Air MuseumYork, North Yorkshire | 2 | £17 | 54 | Halifax 'Friday the 13th' — the world's only complete Halifax reconstruction, honouring the type that flew from this very field —… |
| Avro Heritage MuseumStockport, Greater Manchester | 1 | £9 | 14 | Vulcan XM603 — the only all-white Vulcan on display anywhere, in original anti-flash nuclear livery — plus walk-in Lancaster and Nimrod… |
| Bentwaters Cold War MuseumWoodbridge, Suffolk | 1 | £7.50 | 9 | Bentwaters Cold War Museum occupies the actual USAF hardened command post — war room, battle cabin and decontamination showers intact —… |
| Hooton Park HangarsEllesmere Port, Cheshire | 1 | £9 | 45 | Hooton Park's 1917 Belfast-truss hangars — among the finest WWI aviation buildings surviving — hold aircraft, buses and a printing museum… |
| IWM DuxfordCambridge, Cambridgeshire | 1 | £29 | 146 | Concorde 101 (G-AXDN), the pre-production development aircraft and the fastest Concorde of them all at Mach 2.23 — plus an SR-71A… |
| Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage CentreSpilsby, Lincolnshire | 1 | £13.50 | 11 | Lancaster NX611 (taxiing now, returning to flight one day, they swear) and Mosquito NF.II HJ711 — the only running Mosquito in Europe.… |
| RAF Air Defence Radar MuseumNorwich, Norfolk | 1 | £14 | 3 | The original 1942 Ground Controlled Interception room and its Cold War successor: Britain's actual air-defence nervous system, in situ,… |
| RAF Coltishall Heritage CentreNorwich, Norfolk | 1 | Free | 5 | RAF Coltishall's guardroom museum, curated by veterans of the base — the Jaguar force's spiritual home, free to enter on open days, with… |
| RAF Defford MuseumWorcester, Worcestershire | 1 | £18 | 1 | RAF Defford's museum at National Trust Croome tells the secret radar-flight-trials story — TRE's airborne laboratory squadrons — from… |
| Rolls Royce Heritage TrustDerby, Derbyshire | 1 | By appointment | 1 | The Rolls-Royce Heritage Trust's Derby collection: the jet engine's family tree in the metal, from Eagle to Trent, toured by people who… |
| Romney Marsh Wartime CollectionRomney Marsh, Kent | 1 | £8 | 5 | The Romney Marsh Wartime Collection at Brenzett: a former Women's Land Army hostel stuffed with locally dug aircraft archaeology from the… |
| South Wales Aviation MuseumBarry, Vale of Glamorgan | 1 | £10 | 73 | The resident Harrier and a growing VC10/Tornado-era collection, most with steps and open canopies. Kids exit wearing thousand-yard grins. |
| Stoneykirk Aviation MuseumStranraer, Dumfries and Galloway | 1 | £6 | 9 | Stoneykirk: one enthusiast's cockpit collection on a Galloway croft, Vulcan included, with tea, cakes and a perfect 5.0 rating — the… |
| Suffolk Aviation Heritage MuseumIpswich, Suffolk | 1 | £5 | 5 | Kesgrave's Suffolk Aviation Heritage Museum: a Vampire, Jet Provost and Hunter plus a strong Falklands room, run with infectious… |
| The Shuttleworth CollectionBiggleswade, Bedfordshire | 1 | £19.50 | 55 | The 1934 DH.88 Comet 'Grosvenor House', winner of the MacRobertson England–Australia air race, restored to fly; and the Edwardians —… |
| The Vulcan Experience (XH558)Doncaster, South Yorkshire | 1 | £12 | 2 | The Vulcan Experience at Doncaster is the retirement home of XH558 — the last-flying Vulcan — with underwing tours, cockpit visits and… |
| Thorpe Camp Visitor CentreLincoln, Lincolnshire | 1 | £7 | 5 | Thorpe Camp preserves RAF Woodhall Spa's communal site — home of 617 Squadron post-Dams — as a period village of huts, with volunteers in… |
| Ulster Aviation Society (Maze Long Kesh)Lisburn, County Antrim | 1 | By appointment | 63 | The Shorts family — SC.1 vertical take-off research aircraft included — plus a Buccaneer, Phantom, Wildcat, and a newly arrived AV-8… |
| Wings Aviation MuseumHaywards Heath, West Sussex | 1 | £13 | 25 | The Wings Museum near Balcombe displays Eastern Front and D-Day aircraft archaeology in crash-site dioramas — raw, unpolished and… |
Questions
Frequently asked
Who designed the Canberra?
W.E.W. Petter began the design at Westland and developed it after joining English Electric in December 1944. Roland Beamont flew the first prototype on 13 May 1949.
Where were Canberras and Lightnings built?
In Lancashire, with production at Samlesbury and flight test at Warton. Canberras were also built under licence elsewhere, including by Martin in the US as the B-57.
What happened to English Electric?
Its aircraft business joined BAC in 1960. The rest of the group merged with GEC in 1968.