Photograph by Paul Cremin on 27 June 2026 at the Shuttleworth Festival of Flight Air Show, taken with a Canon EOS 7D Mk II and a Canon 100–400mm zoom lens, f13, 1/200 sec, ISO 100.
Built in 1943 at Avro’s Yeadon factory in Yorkshire, MH120 has survived more than eight decades of military and civilian aviation, including accidents, ownership changes and an extensive restoration. After serving with the Royal Australian Air Force, the aircraft entered civilian service and eventually underwent a painstaking restoration in New Zealand. Today, registered OO-ANS and operated by R.A.F. Station Czechoslovakia, MH120 is regarded as the only airworthy original Anson Mk.I.
MH120 was constructed at Avro’s Yeadon factory in Yorkshire in 1943, during the height of Britain’s wartime aircraft-production effort. Yeadon was producing aircraft on a huge industrial scale, supported by engineers, craftsmen, inspectors and thousands of other workers whose contribution was essential to the production of every aircraft. MH120 left the factory as an Anson Mk.I and was allocated the serial MH120. Unlike many wartime aircraft, its story continued long after military service ended.
Following the war, MH120 avoided the scrapyard and entered civilian service in Australia as VH-BAF. It worked in several commercial roles, including passenger, freight and survey operations. That working life proved crucial to its survival at a time when most wartime Ansons were being retired, dismantled or lost. Even after suffering an accident during take-off at Moorabbin in 1960, MH120 was rebuilt rather than scrapped. The aircraft later appeared in the 1990 television production Half a World Away, recreating the 1934 MacRobertson Air Race. For filming, the Anson was temporarily presented as a Boeing 247D. By the end of the twentieth century, MH120 had become a remarkably rare survivor.
Today, MH120 carries the markings of K6183, VX-B of No. 206 Squadron RAF, rather than its own original identity. K6183 was lost over the North Sea on 5 September 1939, during the opening days of the Second World War. The markings worn by MH120 serve as a tribute to that aircraft, its crew and the wider generation of Anson crews who flew early Coastal Command patrols. It is important to distinguish the two identities: the aircraft is genuinely MH120; K6183 is the aircraft it represents.
In 2024, MH120 began another remarkable chapter, leaving New Zealand for Europe. Following reassembly and preparation at FASTAero in Belgium, the aircraft returned to flight from Brasschaat on 1 June 2025. It subsequently moved to the Czech Republic, joining R.A.F. Station Czechoslovakia and operating from Podhořany. Its arrival marked the return of one of the world’s rarest flying warbirds to the European airshow circuit.
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