Restoration of RAAF Mossie is started

Flight Journal, Aug 2003 by Hastings, Paul

In Australia, the RAAF Museum began the mammoth task of restoring the last surviving de Havilland Mosquito PR Mk. XVI, A52-600 (RAF S/N NS631). The photoreconnaissance aircraft is made mostly of wood, and it's one of the few surviving "Mossies" with a WW II combat history.

Late in 1944, the British-built aircraft was shipped to Australia and flown by RAAF 87 Sqn. from Coomalie Creek in the Northern Territory. It ranged far and wide over Japanese-held territory and clocked up at least 21 photographic missions, many in support of the 1945 invasion of Borneo. After the War, it was flown 19 times by Survey Flight, which mapped large parts of Australia. In 1947, after 321 hours of flying, it was converted into an instructional airframe. In 1954, it was sold to a farmer in Victoria, who removed the outer wings and tailplane with a chainsaw.

The RAAF acquired it in 1987 and moved it to the RAAF Museum in 1997, where it waited in the restoration queue. Although some work was done earlier, the serious restoration effort has only recently begun. The fuselage is mounted in a specially built jig and is little more than a hollow shell. All the fittings have been removed for restoration. The missing rear fuselage section is being built, but the wing, which was built as a one-piece unit, is now in three sections and has deteriorated badly. Owing to the work's complexity, it may be a decade before the Mosquito is complete.

A total of 432 PR Mk. XVIs were built, and A52-600 is the last of these to survive.