Operated by 46 Sqn, a former fighter squadron that became a transport squadron at the start of 1945 using Stirlings. Photo from: Imperial War Museums

Transport version of the Stirling. Seen here operating a troop repatriation flight from India. Photo from: Imperial War Museums

An early Stirling Mk.V, presumably pictured on 27 June 1944. An unarmed transport variant of the outdated Stirling bomber, the Mk.V had an upward-hinging glass nose and a cargo door on the starboard side of the fuselage. 162 examples were built, most of them after the end of the war in Europe.

The obsolete Stirling bomber remained in production until November 1945 as the Mk.5 transport. In 1947 Trans-Air of Belgium bought ten Stirling Mk.5s and actually commenced cargo and even passenger flights, a load of 28 Belgian missionaries surviving the crash of the first one, OO-XAC, in China. At least six of these were sold to Egypt in 1948 and saw action against Israel as makeshift bombers. This airframe, OO-XAS, ex PK153, was flown from Blackbushe to Madrid via Brussels in October 1949. It is not clear if it went to Egypt too.