King’s Lynn’s very successful ‘Spitfire Trail’, was brought to a positive conclusion at the Town Hall on 3rd December with the auctioning of the model planes for charity.
The trail of 24 individually decorated model Spitfires, organised by Flight Lieutenant Pauline Petch the Commanding Officer of the towns 42F Air Cadet Squadron in conjunction with the Borough Council, saw the planes positioned around the town’s historic areas from July until September. The trail, launched on 18th July to coincide with the Squadron exercising its Freedom of the Borough for the first time, saw over 11,000 trail leaflets requested by both locals and visitors to the town.
Around sixty people attended a 1940’s themed dinner with musical accompaniment by singing duo ‘Timescape’ before auctioneer Fabian Eagle from Swaffham took to the rostrum. The manufacturer of the model planes Aden Hynes the proprietor of ‘Sculpture Studios’ in Basildon Essex also attended to admire the individual artwork that had been applied to his creations. At the end of the evening all the planes had been sold raising over £3,000. The money will go to charity, being divided between The Royal Air Forces Association (RAFA), Walking With The Wounded and 42F (King’s Lynn) Squadron ATC who will in turn be donating a proportion of their share to the East Anglian Air Ambulance (EAAA) in line with all their 2015 Squadron fundraising.
At the end of the evening, Borough Mayor Councillor Colin Manning, told Flight Lieutenant Petch that the auction had been an excellent finale to a very successful event for both the town and its air cadet squadron.