Royal Air Force Museum Cosford, Shropshire - Admission Free
Admission is free to the museum in the West Midlands, which houses 70 aircraft and is home to War Planes, Missiles, Transport & Training and Research & Development collections. The National Cold War Exhibition with its interactive kiosks and hotspots gives visitors a chance to see what life was like behind the Iron Curtain.
Please note whilst entry to the museum is Free to all visitors there is a small car parking charge at the Museum. Click here for car parking charges.
Latest News: 16 May 2012
May Open Cockpits Competition - Winners
Thanks to those who entered our competition for tickets to the Open Cockpits Evening Saturday 19th May 2012. We had an amazing 185 people enter the competition to win two pairs of tickets to the event.
The lucky winners are Mr Easton from Henley in Arden and Ms Gupta from Manchester, congratulations to you both.
Tickets for the May Open Cockpits Evening are now sold out, but there will be a second Cockpits Evening on Saturday 22nd September 2012. Tickets will be on sale from July so please keep checking the website for updates.
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Flying display honours National Service Veterans
20th May 2012
Vulcan flypast 12:25pm (weather permitting)
Lancaster display 1:00pm (weather permitting)
The Battle of Britain Memorial Flight Lancaster and Vulcan XH558 will be taking to the skies over Shropshire in honour of the thousands of National Service RAF veterans. These iconic aircraft will perform for visitors and guests at the National Service (RAF) Association parade, taking place at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford on Sunday 20th May 2012.
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Conservation Centre Celebrates 10 Years with Spitfire flypast
Sunday 13th May 2012
Conservation Centre Open 10.00am to 2.00pm
Spitfire flypast scheduled for 1.30pm (weather permitting)
On Monday 13th May 2002 the Michael Beetham Conservation Centre at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford was officially opened for business by Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Michael Beetham. Built as a centre of excellence for aircraft restoration, a team of skilled Technicians and Apprentices have during the last decade conserved many of the world’s most historic and rarest aircraft. Now about to celebrate its 10th anniversary the Museum is looking back at some of the aircraft to have passed through its doors during this period.
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Help the Museum and win £100 voucher from Amazon.
The Royal Air Force Museum would like to invite you to take part in a short survey that will be used to help the museum gain some insight into the thoughts of our visitors into museum membership.
We do hope you will fill in the survey. It should take no more than 5 minutes.
Everyone completing the survey will be entered into a prize draw and one entry, drawn at random will win an Amazon voucher worth £100.
The survey closes on Monday 21st May so if you would like to take part, please do so before then.
To start the survey just click on the link highlighted in blue below.
Many thanks for your help.
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This month's Flickr Appeal : To Tods from Somebody
This collection of photographs, taken from an album discovered during a recent inventory of unrecorded photographs, was donated to the Museum in 1976.
The photographs, which date from 1918, were taken by Lt Geoffrey Campbell Scarr as he served with the RFC/RAF. He compiled this album for a little girl he nicknamed "Tods", a child of a close friend. Lt Scarr was known to Tods as "Somebody" and he would write letters to her about his days of flying. Unfortunately Lt Scarr died in a flying accident 18 November 1918.
Can you provide more information and help the Museum record these photographs in more detail?
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View our latest collection of Flickr photographs
Young Curators design WW2 exhibition
Youngsters from Albrighton Primary School will be unveiling a WW2 exhibition next week at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford in front of friends and family. Pupils have worked alongside staff at the Museum as part of the ‘Young Curators Project’ learning how to handle and display artefacts, write labels and produce display boards for their exhibition.
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Comet pilot unveils anniversary exhibition
Wednesday 2nd May 2012
11.30am
On the 2nd May 1952 a BOAC de Havilland Comet 1 carried 36 passengers on the first leg of a journey from London to Johannesburg on what was the first fare paying passenger flight in a Jet Airliner. To mark the 60th anniversary of this historic flight, the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford will be unveiling a specially commissioned temporary exhibition which charts the Comets story and includes previously unseen archive film footage. The exhibition will be displayed alongside the Museum’s Comet, the only complete Comet 1 remaining anywhere in the world.
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HM THE QUEEN TO VISIT SHROPSHIRE FOR HUGE DIAMOND JUBILEE CELEBRATION
HM The Queen is coming to Shropshire in July as part of her Diamond Jubilee Tour – and everyone in the county is invited. Along with His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh, The Queen is due to attend the spectacular Diamond Jubilee event at RAF Cosford and The Royal Air Force Museum on 12th July, when the county stages its celebration of “60 Glorious Years”.
The Lord-Lieutenant, Her Majesty’s representative in Shropshire, is delighted that The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh are able to attend Shropshire’s day. Mr Algernon Heber-Percy said,
“We hope that this will be one of the most memorable days Shropshire can remember. This will be a unique opportunity for the County to thank Her Majesty for her exceptional dedication and leadership, which she has given us all over the last 60 years.”
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Cockpits open for Museums at Night
THIS EVENT IS NOW SOLD OUT
Tickets are now sold out for the ever popular ‘Open Cockpits Evening’ at the Royal Air Force Museum Cosford. The evening will commence at 6pm on Saturday 19th May. A total of 16 aircraft will be available for close viewing on the night: including transport aircraft, jet fighters plus unique research airframes. Exclusively for this evening the Museum will be opening up one of its latest arrivals, weather permitting, the Hercules - a military transport aircraft.
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Nearly New Aviation Bookstall Update
A big thank you to all those who have donated books to the museum shop nearly new bookstall.
We have been overwhelmed with the generosity of people in donating aviation books and magazines. The bookstall has been so successful, we now require more books.
These items will then be sold by the shop with the money raised going to the continued and ongoing maintenance of the Museum’s collections.
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2012 Apprenticeships with RAF Museum Cosford
The Royal Air Force Museum has 2 places available for Heritage Aircraft Engineering Advanced Apprenticeships this year.
The apprenticeships are based at the award winning Michael Beetham Conservation Centre (MBCC) located adjacent to the Museums Cosford Site in the West Midlands.
The MBCC was awarded 2010 National Small Employer of the Year by the National Apprenticeship Service and was Highly Commended in 2011 it is also placed in the countries Top 100 Apprentice Employer list.
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Visit The National Apprenticeship Website
Museum's Review of 2011 now available to download
2011 proved to be quite a year for both our London and Cosford's sites and 2012 is currently shaping up to be even better.
We now have available to download our annual review which recaps on the major events that happened at the Museum last year such as:
- The arrival of the Hercules, Dominie and Comper Swift at Cosford.
- The live broadcast of Any Questions from our London site.
- The unveiling of a permanent tribute at Cosford to National Service Personnel.
- The progress of the Wellington Restoration.
- The progress of the Dornier Project.
To read about these stories and more, please click on the link below.
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Read our review of the year for 2011
WIN Tickets to the Open Cockpits Evening – Saturday 19th May 2012
Competition now Closed - Thanks to those who entered - winners will be announced shortly.
We have two pairs of tickets for the Open Cockpits Evening on Saturday 19th May 2012 to give away to the value of £20.00 (per pair). To be in with a chance of winning simply email the answer to the following question to us at the address below with your name and contact phone number:
What is a cockpit?
a) Where the pilot sits
b) Part of the undercarriage
c) Part of the engine
Competition closes on Monday 14th May 2012.
Terms & Conditions apply.
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Open Cockpits Evening - How to buy tickets
Gigantic Delivery for RAF Museum Cosford
The RAF Museum today took delivery of a Nimrod fuselage, which arrived in style on a low loader lorry. The fuselage of Nimrod R.1 XV249 was escorted from Kemble, Gloucestershire with the load measuring some 38 metres in length.
The wings and some remaining components of the aircraft will be delivered in the near future and the Nimrod will then be re-assembled on site, before going on static display at the museum later on this year.
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Through the Eyes of a Service Child
Free to Enter Photography Competition for U.K. Service Children.
Following the success of the 2011 ‘Through the eyes of a Service Child’ Art competition, the Service Children Support Network in association with the Royal Air Force Museum is proud to launch their 2012 ‘Through the eyes of a Service Child’ photographic competition; the winning entries of which will be displayed in an exhibition at the Museum’s London site later this year.
The children of all personnel currently serving in any of the United Kingdom’s three Armed Services (Navy, RAF or Army) and their Reserve Units are invited to submit a photograph that reflects their experience as a Service Child. Entries are by age category: Aged 5 and Under; Age 6 to 9 years; Age 10 to 13 years; and age 14 to 18 years – with each child able to submit a maximum of 3 photographs per entry.
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Listen to our new podcast: Women's Suffrage and Women Pilots
The turn of the last century was a period of immense technological and social upheaval, leading many to question the role of women in society and the discrimination that they suffered particularly when it came to them not having the right to vote.
There were, at the time, many pioneering female aviators from across the world that helped demonstrate that women were just as capable as men - women such as Mrs Winifred Buller who worked as a test pilot for the British Caudron Company based in Cricklewood and Harriet Quimby who became the first woman to fly across the English Channel.
In this podcast we examine their achievements and those of other early female aviators and look at how the equality of women as pilots helped advance the profile of the Women's Suffrage movement in the United Kingdom.
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Listen to Women's Suffrage and Women Pilots
Sir Richard Branson kick starts Dornier Fundraising Campaign.
The Royal Air Force Museum has launched a fundraising campaign to rescue the sole surviving example of the WWII Dornier Do-17 aircraft.
The Museum is now appealing to the public to raise the remaining £250,000 to complete the recovery and restoration project. The public fundraising campaign is also endorsed by Sir Richard Branson who is a supporter of the Museum.
Sir Richard Branson states: “The discovery of the Dornier is of international importance. Please support the RAF Museum’s appeal to save this unique aircraft as a tribute to the loss of life on both sides of the Battle of Britain.”
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Make a donation to the Dornier Do-17 restoration campaign
Dornier 17 Underwater Footage Now Available To View
As recently reported the Royal Air Force Museum has been working with Wessex Archeology and English Heritage on a German bomber that was shot down in the Battle of Britain in 1940.
In addition to a micro-site which gives further details about this project the Museum has now placed on YouTube previously unseen film-footage of an underwater survey of the Dornier which took place on 2nd & 3rd of June at Goodwin Sands.
To view this film, please select the link below.
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View the Dornier 17 Underwater Survey
The exhibitions at Cosford contain only a fraction of the overall holdings of the RAF Museum. In London, at Hendon, the Royal Air Force Museum London displays an equally large and important part of our collection.
