PERCIVAL E.2H MEW GULL - G-AEXF (1937) This aircraft was built for air racing, it is one of only six examples built and the sole survivor of those six. In 1938 this very aircraft achieved a staggering 270 mph, faster than the Hawker Hurricane at sea level. Between February 5th and February 9th 1939, air race pilot Alex Henshaw, flying this specially modified Percival E.2H Mew Gull, set a number of records for solo flight between Gravesend London and Wingfield Cape Town, many of which still stand to this very day almost 65 years later.

Henshaw's epic flight to the Cape and back is regarded by many as being one of the most amazing feats of airmanship, navigational skill and human endurance. He spent in excess of sixty hours airborne over a period of only a hundred and three hours and travelling at an average speed on the outward leg of 209.44 mph. The demands on both the pilot and aircraft were enormous, he made ten takeoffs, the majority from very poor airstrips whilst dangerously overloaded with fuel. To compound these difficulties, the aircraft suffers from very poor forward visibility making landing and taking-off a challenge at the best of times but almost impossible during the hours of darkness, yet amazingly, four takeoffs were made at night.

Pilot fatigue, atmospheric haze, thunderstorms, ice, fog and darkness ate into what remaining margin for error Henshaw may have believed he had. Against all the odds, 39 hours and 23 minutes after leaving Gravesend, after negotiating desert and jungle landscape largely devoid of landmarks, suffering an attack of malaria and a partially severed finger, he landed at Cape Town, a total distance of 6377 miles. The return trip to London was completed in the slightly slower time of 39 hours and 36 minutes.

In addition to the Cape records, Alex Henshaw and G-AEXF hold the fastest ever Kings Cup victory, achieving an average speed of 236.25 mph over a triangular course of 1012.14 miles.