BASIC BUILD
In a heady bout of nostalgia, CHRIS CLIFFORD completes International Rescue’s handsome 1/350 Thunderbird 3 rocket, courtesy of Adventures in Plastic.
When I think of my favourite TV programmes as a child in the early 1970s, two shows stand head and shoulders above the rest… Captain Scarlet and Thunderbirds. What youngster couldn’t fail to be captivated by all the cool hardware and interesting characters, brainchildren of the programmes’ visionary creators Gerry and Sylvia Anderson.
The episodic Thunderbirds stories involved International Rescue – a team of courageous lifesaving specialists equipped with numbered vehicles and flying machines, with its headquarters on Tracy Island. The organisation was lead by former astronaut Jeff Tracy, the vehicles being crewed by his five adult sons. Mention Thunderbirds - which first aired in 1965 - to anyone of a certain age and Barry Gray’s stirring musical score will instantly come to mind, along with the famous five-digit countdown sequence. Thunderbird 3 was a splendid deep orange-coloured rocket with a tri-motor format, and could be equipped with different docking collars. In kit form, it has been released in different scales over the years, since 1965. T…
