{"id":154923,"date":"2024-03-29T08:00:56","date_gmt":"2024-03-29T12:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=154923"},"modified":"2024-03-28T14:07:50","modified_gmt":"2024-03-28T18:07:50","slug":"valor-friday-269","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=154923","title":{"rendered":"Valor Friday"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Jeff Brereton in Hawker Hurricane<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Most of us can remember what it was like to be a young adult and in service to our country. For Jeff Brereton, he served in the RAF during WWII. As an aircraft mechanic, he worked on Hawker Hurricanes. One of the aircraft he worked on during the Blitz was a Mk I Hurricane. On the front lines of the Battle of Britain, it’s amazing that any of those early series survived the war. Thanks in part to Brereton, one of them had.<\/p>\n

Of the nearly 15,000 Hurricanes built between 1937 and 1944, and across 22 distinct variants, only a handful of Hurricanes remain flying. Overall, there’s only 16 airworthy Hurricanes remaining (three of them of the naval variant, Sea Hurricanes). It so happens that the final Mk I still flying around is one that a young Brereton wrenched on more than 80 years ago.<\/p>\n

Having recently celebrated his 102nd birthday, Brereton was reunited with the Hurricane he worked on all those years ago. Then, taking a back seat in the only airworthy two-seater, he flew off the wing of his old warbird.<\/p>\n

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Hawker Hurricane R4118 – Once worked on by Brereton<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I have a hard time imagining what it would be like for me to live to that age, have one of the planes I served on also survive to that point (remaining airworthy no less), and then getting to climb aboard. I guess I’ll see y’all in 2080 or so for my feel good story.<\/p>\n

The Royal Air Force Association<\/a> has the story;<\/p>\n

A WWII RAF veteran had the chance to fly alongside the aircraft he helped maintain during the heroic Battle of Britain in 1940.<\/p>\n

Jeff Brereton, who celebrated this 102nd birthday earlier this year, took to the air in BE505, the world\u2019s only two seat Hurricane, with R4118, the only remaining airworthy Mk 1 Hurricane to have taken part in the Battle of Britain, and the aircraft Jeff worked on, flying alongside.<\/p>\n

Jeff in the cockpit of his hurricane
\nJeff, who lives in Evesham, Worcestershire, said: \u201cI have great memories of the plane. Of all the aircraft I dealt with, that was the one that stuck in my mind. It was unbelievable to be able to see that aircraft again, that it had survived.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the flight, Jeff recounted: \u201cOnce you leave that ground, you\u2019re in a completely different world altogether. You can\u2019t have that feeling on Earth. You see the same clouds, but they don\u2019t look the same, they don\u2019t feel the same. I can\u2019t wait to do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeff\u2019s amazing story first come to light when he gave an interview with Air Mail, the RAF Association\u2019s member magazine. The team realised that the Hurricane Jeff worked on had not only been restored but was still flying.<\/p>\n

The Association immediately got in touch with James Brown, the current owner of the R4118 Hurricane. James runs Hurricane Heritage, an organisation based at the historic White Waltham Airfield where visitors can experience flying in and alongside these iconic aircraft.<\/p>\n

James arranged for Jeff to come to the airfield with his family and jump in the cockpit and take to the skies.<\/p>\n

James said: \u201cThe story is just an unbelievable coincidence and it\u2019s so incredibly lucky to have found Jeff. I just couldn\u2019t believe that there was this amazing guy who was still around and actually remembers working on our Hurricane.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeff volunteered for the RAF in January 1940 at just 19-years-old. He was called up that spring and sent on an aero-engineering course where he qualified as a Flight Mechanic \u2013 Engine.<\/p>\n

He joined 605 Squadron at RAF Croydon and was soon repairing Hurricanes, including R4118, in the hectic days of the Battle of Britain.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

If you want to see Jeff’s flight, there’s video at the source.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Most of us can remember what it was like to be a young adult and in … Valor Friday<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":154924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187,10,389,226,217],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-154923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-air-force","category-historical","category-valor","category-veterans-in-the-news","category-we-remember"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/664"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=154923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154923\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/154924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=154923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=154923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=154923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}