Hercules warplanes flying over Midlands in farewell RAF flight – when and where to see them

Hercules warplanes will fly around the Midlands in a fond farewell to the iconic aircraft. Ahead of its retirement from the RAF, a trio of Hercules are doing a national “flypast” tomorrow, Wednesday June 13.

We have the full route and timings listed below so you won’t miss this spectacular and poignant aerial display. The RAF said that locations of “significance to the Hercules’ service and 47 Squadron” had been added in, which includes the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas, near Lichfield.

It has been 57 years since the first Hercules arrived at Marshall’s of Cambridge in December 1966. Since then, it has been an integral part of UK military and humanitarian relief operations around the world including Afghanistan. But the Hercules will no longer be used by the RAF after June 30 this year.

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Residents across Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Shropshire will be among the first in the UK to spot the Hercules at the start of the day. It then heads off to as far as Northern Ireland, Scotland, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Salisbury Plain near Stonehenge.

The military aircraft leave RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire at 10am. Within minutes locals need to keep their eyes peeled to the skies as the warplanes head across Marston Green, Balsall Common and Tamworth before reaching the National Memorial Arboretum at 10.25am.

The flight route then takes them west over Cannock to north of Wolverhampton at Albrighton before shifting direction towards Shifnal and Telford in Shropshire.