THE STORY OF THE BRISTOL FREIGHTER T170

Where a giant lives on…

Our Bristol Freighter T170 was built right here in Filton. In the 1950s this aircraft type, used to carry cars, people, and even racehorses. It’s now the only one of its kind in Europe.

We are now embarking on our most ambitious conservation project to date, to bring the Bristol Freighter back to life through conserving and reassembling the aircraft.

The Bristol Freighter was designed and built in Bristol in the late 1940s and early 1950s by the Bristol Aeroplane Company, as a pioneering post-war cargo  aircraft. With its distinctive clamshell nose doors and 108ft wingspan, it was capable of carrying cargo ranging from vehicles to livestock and was later adapted for passenger travel as the “Wayfarer”.

It was even the first post-war aircraft to receive an unrestricted Certificate of Airworthiness and played an important role in advancing aviation technology and operations worldwide.

Our Freighter

Serial number NZ5911, is one of just 12 freighters still in existence and the only one remaining in Europe. It served with the Royal New Zealand Air Force’s No. 41 Squadron from 1955, operating across Southeast Asia during the Cold War and Vietnam War era in the 1970s.

The aircraft was returned to Bristol in 2018 following a major international recovery effort led by Aerospace Bristol volunteers and supported by partners including the Association for Industrial Archaeology. Having spent decades in storage in New Zealand, it is now being slowly brought back to life next to the very location it was originally designed and built.

Volunteers have worked to clean the aircraft, and treat areas where metal had been damaged by corrosion. The aim is to display the Freighter safely outside, repainted to protect it from the weather.

It will wear the livery of the New Zealand Air Force - including the kiwi.

Bristol Freighter NZ591’s Timeline

Follow the story of the Bristol Freighter T170…

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