By Kevin Wilkins
Another iconic Douglas C-47 is changing hands. The well-known “movie star” C-47, serial 42-100884 and registered as G-DAKS / N147DC, has been acquired by American businessman Jeff Lewis. Since 1979, the UK-based aviation film company Aces High has operated this aircraft, making it the longest-serving Douglas DC-3 in England. The aircraft was recently flown from North Weald to Southend for a long-overdue, in-depth maintenance check ahead of its planned move to the United States. It had not flown since the 2019 Daks Over Normandy events at Duxford and Caen, but in late November, it took to the air again for the first time in five years, repositioning from North Weald to Southend for additional care.
Built at the Douglas plant in Long Beach in 1942, N147DC is believed to be the lowest-time airworthy DC-3/C-47 in the world, with just over 3,500 hours on the airframe. Originally delivered to the United States Army Air Forces, the aircraft first flew in 1943. She served with the 79th Troop Carrier Squadron out of Membury during D-Day as 42-100884. In 1944, she was transferred to the Royal Air Force at Netheravon as TS423 and, shortly before the end of the war, reassigned to 436 Squadron of the RCAF at Down Ampney. She also flew with a Heavy Glider Unit and took part in both the Arnhem operation and the D-Day landings. Unusually, she was one of the few RAF aircraft used for glider “snatch” recovery work, a hazardous assignment. She later participated in supply drops during the Berlin Airlift.
After the war, TS423 passed through several companies, including Short Brothers, Scottish Aviation, Marshalls, and Ferranti. At Ferranti, she was fitted with a distinctive non-standard nose housing air-pass radar for the Lightning fighter and a hydraulically operated gun turret. She also received equipment for deploying sonar buoys beneath the fuselage. In 1969, with surprisingly low hours (around 3,000), TS423 was delivered to the Ministry of Technology at RAE West Freugh. Nine years later, still in storage and now named “Mayfly,” the aircraft was slated by the Ministry of Defence to be scrapped at the Catterick fire dump. Mike Woodley of Aces High, with assistance from the Imperial War Museum and Lord Onslow, managed to save her from this fate.
On September 14, 1979, TS423 was officially registered as G-DAKS and received extensive cosmetic work at Duxford to restore her original Douglas nose. After this reverse “nose job,” she made her television debut as “Vera Lynn” of Ruskin Air Services in the 1979 Yorkshire Television series Airline. In the decades that followed, “Mayfly” appeared in an impressive list of film and television productions, including Darkest Hour, Catch-22, Breathe, Woman in Gold, Poirot, Tenko, Quantum of Solace, The Monuments Men, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Allies, Dirty Dozen 2, Memphis Belle, The Da Vinci Code, White Hunter Black Heart, Red 2, Saving Private Ryan, Band of Brothers, Land Girls, Guernsey, and Red Tails. A true movie star indeed. It has now been announced that “Mayfly” will depart Britain after a series of farewell airshow appearances during the spring and early summer of 2026.
