My first contact with the Hawker Hunter occurred one weekend back in August of 1995, when I arrived for my regular shift of volunteer work at the Museum. As I walked in the door, I was asked by one of the full-time staff if I had seen the Hawker Hunter sitting between the two hangars that made up the Museum complex at that time.
"What the hell is a Hawker Hunter?" I asked, and proceeded to go back outside to check out what I would soon understand was the Museum's most recent acquisition to the collection at that date. What I saw sitting between the hangars was a 1950s vintage jet fighter painted in the national markings of Switzerland. The plane was sitting in a wooden cradle with its wings disassembled as well as the tail section of the aircraft. The canopy was covered and tied down with a sheet of blue canvas. I remember looking at this new exhibit and saying something like, "Oh...........OK."
A few weeks later, the Hunter wings and tail had been re-assembled and I was fortunate enough to witness the Museum engineering staff positioning the Hunter into its place of public display in the hangar when I had arrived. Seeing the aircraft fully assembled completely changed my viewpoint on the aircraft from "Oh.........OK" to "Wow!!!!!!..........Look at that!!!!!!!!"
Now I sometimes sit in the cockpit of the Hunter and wonder what it must be like to fly this airplane. I wonder about the airmen who flew it in Switzerland, and I wonder what stories there are to tell about the Hawker Hunter.
The Hunter had been donated to the Museum by the Swiss Air Force after the retirement of the airplane, and this made up the Museum's second jet aircraft. It is interesting to note that the Museum's first jet aircraft to go on display was a deHavilland Vampire, also donated by the Swiss Air Force; Swiss registration J-1145.
In 1993, our Museum suffered a tragic fire, which destroyed one of the hangars and six of the aircraft, mostly Second World War vintage, that were housed within it. To the benefit of the Museum, the fire allowed construction of the new facility which we are now in, and it was within this new building that I found my attraction with the Hunter taken to new heights. The Museum is dedicated to the preservation and display of aircraft which have been flown by Canadian airmen through the history of our country's air force. The Hunter, being a British aircraft by design and carrying Swiss markings, was placed into a corner and basically forgotten about while the upkeep of aircraft was concentrated on those of which in the collection take to the skies and appear at various airhsows throughout Canada and the United States.
I had this fact pointed out to me one day in 1996 by an associate, when he noticed how "filthy" the Hunter appeared to be as it sat in the corner. I did not let this comment go unnoticed, and I, along with a friend of mine, decided to "adopt" the Hunter and bring it up to the outstanding display quality which it now appears. We approached official Museum personnel about this matter and we were given approval to proceed with the upkeep of the Hunter.
In 1997, the Hunter Crew was created, and since that time, we have put in over 900 hours maintaining J-4006 in display condition. I can't say for sure just what it is that I find so appealing about an old airplane that was built eleven years before I was born, but each week when I work on my "Swiss Lady" as I sometimes call her, my fondness for the Hawker Hunter continues to grow...........
If anyone has any comments, suggestions, contributions, or objections to any of the material presented in this site, please e-mail the Hunter Crew via the e-mail prompt located on the main index page.