EMERGENCY repair work is due to start on an historic war hangar.
Hooton Park Trust has secured English Heritage funding of £122,000 for emergency repair work on hangar two, to start on June 8.
The funding comes after several years of failed bids by the trust.
The work, on the central drain on the hangar roof, aims to relieve flooding and prevent the roof collapsing, which happened to hangar three and is now beyond repair.
Trust board member Graham Sparkes said: “We hope the work will help save hangar two and prevent collapse like hangar three.
“We also hope that the backing from English Heritage will give us more credibility and result in support from other funding bodies.
“A lot of funding we investigated required match-funding from the trust which we could either not afford or wanted to save for a bigger project.”
Last week The Pioneer reported on the dispute between the trust and 610 Squadron Association, containing veteran members who served in The Battle of Britain, which currently leaves the association expelled from the former RAF airfield.
One of the association’s criticisms was the lack of repair/restorative work on the Belfast hangars, built in 1917, carried out by the trust in the nine years it has been established.
This week Hooton Park Trust passed on details of grants applied for but not approved during its nine-year tenure:
Heritage Lottery Fund application for HETI – Hooton’s Education and Training Initiative – £6.5m applied for in 2001 which would have funded the refurbishment of all three hangars resulting in an exhibition centre. Scheme deemed too ambitious and rejected in 2003.
Local Heritage Initiative investigated – 2005
Heritage Lottery Fund Your Heritage grants £5,000-£50,000 investigated 2006 for ancillary building hut 27
Trust House Charitable Foundation – 2006
WREN (Waste Recycling Environmental Limited) Landfill Tax Credit Scheme – 2007
VEOLIA – Environmental trust
BIFFA – No submission, scheme investigated.
