G-AKIS History

Built in 1947 at Newtownards in Northern Ireland, were a second production line had been created, it received number 6725 and was one of the last Messenger to be built.

It was registered G-AKIS at the name of Miles Aircraft Ltd Woodley, Miles headquarter, the 19th September 1947. The Certificate of Airworthiness n°9762 was delivered the 15 October and the plane was ferried to Woodley the 31st mars 1948 by Hugh Kendall, Miles test pilot.

Stroke off the 1er July, It is re-registered the 14th at Porter de Spiers Ltd, Leicester. The 25th June 1956, it is strike off again before changing of owner the 1er July. The new owner, J.G.Hogg, base it at Rochester then Frinton-on-Sea starting from December 1966.

Again stroke off the 10th may 1969, R.Jaffe de Elstree registers it The 6th June. He will not use it a lot: the aircraft is removed from the list and sold to an unidentified buyer the 25th November.

The 18th December, an aircraft is circling in the sky in the area of Namur (Belgium) and finally, running out of fuel, it did a perfect emergency landing at Géronsart, not far from Jambes.

A few minutes after the landing, a big german car stops on the border of the field and two men hastily take pack that the pilots gave to them.

An eyewitness calls the gendarmes and, when those are arriving, the car disappears at full speed! The nervous behaviour of the pilot surprises the gendarmes and, confronted by his refusal to tell what he is transporting, they ask him the papers. Several passports wearing his name fall of his pocket and he finished at the station.

There, the gendarmes discover that the registration G-AKIS is not valid anymore and the aircraft is definitively grounded.