Channel 4 (UK) Documentaries

Guy Martin's Spitfire (2014x52)

Air date: Oct 12, 2014

In May 1940, while covering the retreat from Dunkirk, a Mark 1 Spitfire flown by RAF ace Squadron Leader Geoffrey Stephenson was shot down and crash-landed on a beach in northern France, where it slowly sank into the sand. The wreckage was finally recovered in the 1980s and stored anonymously in France for more than 20 years. Guy Martin - speed junkie, motorcycle racer, lorry mechanic and Spitfire fanatic - joins a restoration team as it embarks on a two-year rebuild of this Spitfire. This extraordinary project provides a look at the amazing engineering and skills involved in building the aircraft, and is also a fitting homage to the bravery of everyone involved in its service: the male and female factory workers, the ground crews and the pilots. The story of Squadron Leader Stephenson, who would become the Queen's pilot, is like something from a Boy's Own paper, and his private diaries - which he wrote while he was imprisoned in Colditz - have been uncovered for the first time for the programme. Guy invites the pilot's two daughters for an emotional day at Duxford to witness their father's plane flying again.