Legends at full throttle

Last of the Spitfires captured close-up in all their splendour

AS THEY soar across the sky, it is hard to believe more than three-quarters of a century has passed since these glorious fighting machines were helping repel the mighty Luftwaffe.

Almost equally incredible is how pin-sharp these photographs are of some of the remaining 55 airworthy Spitfires, as the planes show off the elegance and manoeuvrability that made them the stuff of legend.

Photographer John Dibbs captured the remarkable images in a plane flown within 15 ft of the Spitfires by former RAF pilot Tim Ellison.

Reaching heights of up to 9,000 ft and speeds of 250 mph, Dibbs had to contend with extreme wind and noise to shoot through an open canopy with a handheld camera. His glorious photographs grace the pages of a book marking the 80th anniversary of the Spitfire’s maiden flight.

The aircraft he photographed include a Mk I Spitfire N3200 that was shot down over the beaches of Dunkirk in 1940, and lay buried for more than 40 years until it was revealed by a huge storm. Incredibly, it was recovered and restored to airworthy condition.

Similarly, Mk I X4650 crashed into a riverbank in Cleveland following a mid- air collision in 1940, and remained hidden until the drought of 1976 uncovered the wreckage. It was painstakingly reconstructed and flew for the first time in 2011.

Mk IX MH434 — which was built in 1943, piloted by a South African flying ace and has never been subject to a re-build — also features.

Dibbs, 50, has gone on more than 1,100 photographic sorties over the past 20 years. ‘It’s exhilarating how close you get,’ he says. ‘ It is an extreme working environment. I always shoot Spitfires through clean air and when the canopy is open it gets a bit chilly up there. I have to overcome the wind and slipstream, which are incredibly strong, as well as the noise and speed. But I’ve been doing it long enough not to get freaked out or airsick.’

Squadron Leader Geoffrey Wellum, 94, who was the youngest Spitfire pilot in the Battle of Britain and was awarded the DFC, writes in the book’s foreword of the first time he flew a Spitfire. ‘She seemed to just slip through the air and flow about the sky, responding eagerly and lightly to every demand made of her by control input . . . We were as one.’

Spitfire — the Legend Lives On by John Dibbs and author tony Holmes (Osprey, £30).