We have failed to identify the above airfield. It should be obvious as it has a terminal building with ornamental garden. Visible in this and other views are six Ansons, seven Tiger Moths, three Skuas, 19 Spitfires along the perimeter and an Ensign.
That on page 77 got a number of guesses but the majority view was that it was Prestwick. A closer look at the only reasonably-detailed plan we have on hand for Prestwick shows this to be true, although the building of runways and the vast expansion in hangars and buildings tend to obscure the fact.

Самолёты на фотографии: Aircrafts on the photo: Armstrong Whitworth Ensign / A.W.27 - ВеликобританияUnited Kingdom - 1938Avro Anson / Type 652 - ВеликобританияUnited Kingdom - 1935Blackburn Skua / B-24 - ВеликобританияUnited Kingdom - 1937De Havilland Tiger Moth / D.H.82 - ВеликобританияUnited Kingdom - 1931Supermarine Spitfire - ВеликобританияUnited Kingdom - 1936

"MU2" was a captured Savoia-Marchetti S-81 which as far as he knows was never given an RAF number. Can anyone confirm this? It had been flown in by the CO of 8 Squadron before he took over the MU and believes it was an unarmed aircraft captured when it got lost on a training flight from Eritrea. When he first flew it at Khormaksar on 26 May 1942, he did not realise it had been lying around there for nearly two years. He decided to turn it into a transport to enable some of the troops to get a holiday at Asmara as they had a pretty poor life at Aden and rarely got out of the place until they were posted. The internal bomb racks were removed and a completely new floor fitted, the cross-members of this being old Vincent spars. It was flown quite a lot by Flt Lt Campbell, an 8 Squadron Vincent pilot. After the fall of Eritrea, Shipley went to Asmara to see what was left and found a lot of Savoia spares, including half-a-dozen Piaggio engines still in their transit cases, so they reengined the S-81. This was a very successful expedition because Aden was so far away from the war that they could never get any spares from the Middle East.

Самолёты на фотографии: Aircrafts on the photo: Savoia-Marchetti / SIAI SM.81 Pipistrello - ИталияItaly - 1935

Самолёты на фотографии: Aircrafts on the photo: Savoia-Marchetti / SIAI SM.81 Pipistrello - ИталияItaly - 1935

Group Captain Edwin Shipley (via Dave Welch) has produced these photographs of his "private air force" when he was CO of 131 MU at Khormaksar, Aden. "MU1" was a captured SAIMAN 202, which had been looked at by several people at Addis Ababa but after opening the bonnet and seeing Alfa-Romeo emblazoned on the engine crankcase had said "No good, no spares". When Shipley saw it, however, he realised that it was actually a licence-built Gipsy III, for which he had spares at 131 MU. The tyres were in poor condition and no spares could be found among the captured Italian Air Force junk at Asmara. Some tyres were found of the correct size to go in the spats but with too large a rim size. The rims were cut out and the USAAF depot at Gura, near Asmara, was persuaded to vulcanise the complete tread on to the old tyres. This unorthodox repair lasted two years and gave no trouble at all. The aircraft was later repainted with the official number HK860 - which was found to be a help when refuelling away from base! This machine later flew with 73 OTU at Ismailia, where Shipley was CTO for about two years around 1943/44. It was later delivered to Heliopolis by Wg Cdr Wilf Sizer on instructions from HQ Middle East.

Самолёты на фотографии: Aircrafts on the photo: Saiman Saiman 202 - ИталияItaly - 1938