September 10,2022: The unmistakable lines of the Nord 2501F-3 Noratlas are more than evident in this view of n° 105 (F-AZVM) at Melun-Villaroche Aerodrome, just to the south of Paris. This photo was taken exactly 73 years to the day since the prototype took to the air from the same airfield in the hands of company test pilots Claude Chautemps and Georges Detre. Operated by the L'association Le Noratlas de Provence out of Marseille Provence Airport in the extreme south of the country, the sole airworthy example of the twin-boom transport was among the stars of the recent Paris Villaroche AIR LEGEND Airshow.Nicknamed 'Le Grise' - or 'The Grey' - this aeroplane is powered by the only flightworthy Bristol Hercules engines in existence. Rolling off the manufacturer's production line at Bourges in central France sometime in early May 1956, the aircraft took to the air on the 24th of that month before entering operational service with the French Air Force in June. By the time n° 105 was withdrawn from use 30 years later, on June 10,1986, it had clocked up 10,772 hours in the air and served with ten units across almost every French operational theatre, including the Suez, the Ivory Coast, Senegal, Gabon, Mali, Mauritania, Chad Reunion, Madagascar, and Comoros.Delivered to Aix-en-Provence Aerodrome in the southwest of France, the aeroplane sat dormant for nearly a decade before returning to the skies on May 29,1995, following a monumental three-year, 24,000-hour restoration. On February 26,2007, it was classified as a Historic Monument of France.
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