G-APAS was the twenty-second DH106 Comet aircraft built at Hatfield in Hertfordshire and the tenth Mark 1A aircraft. She was assigned the serial number 06022 and undertook her first flight on 16 Match 1953. The aircraft was delivered to Air France and assigned the registration code F-BGNZ. Following a series of Comet aircraft crashes attributed to metal fatigue she was returned to de Havilland in June 1956.
F-BGNZ was converted to a Mark 1XB configuration in March 1957 emerging with revised cabin windows and strengthened fuselage and re-registered as G-APAS in May 1957. She served for UK government Ministry of Supply as XM823 and painted in RAF Transport Command colours before retirement to RAF Cosford in 1978. Re-painted in BOAC livery - it is the earliest surviving complete Comet aircraft.
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