Inventor sends last Parahawk to International Spy Museum
28-Dec-2019 • Bond News
The inventor of the Parahawk vehicle, used by Renard's goons to hunt Bond in 'The World Is Not Enough', has donated his last model to the International Spy Museum in Washington DC.
“I never would have thought that a powered parachute would become an evil chase machine of any sort. This was back before you had drones. Drones now have replaced all of this. But powered parachutes were the stepping stone from a helicopter, which is very expensive to do simple aerials. . . I got interested in taking a look at what could be done with a design [that] would make it more suitable for aerial cinematography,” Nicholas Viscio said.
Allan Hewitt, a stunt pilot who was involved in 'The World Is Not Enough', came across the Viscio’s Blue Heron design and felt it would be perfect for the film. The creators purchased 17 of the powered parachutes and Pinewood Studios transformed them into several nefarious machines, four of which are featured on screen. As part of the storyline, they were renamed Parahawks
“They used the base airframe and designed their cowling around it. The body of the aircraft was a visual metaphor [for] the bad guy in the film,” Viscio told the Daily Gazette.
“The snowmobile was a different vehicle. It wasn’t actually the same machine because they weren’t capable. There were some components were used to fake out the snowmobile frames,” Viscio said.
He shut down his company Helderberg Designs four years ago but hung on to one of the Parahawks for air shows. m“It had been sitting around for so long since the business closed. It’s quite an item to show your friends but we started to think that it would probably do a lot better in a different venue,” Viscio said.
He reached out to the International Spy Museum and within a few months signed an agreement with the museum to loan it for the next decade. According to the museum, the Parahawk will be on display in the next month or so. The Museum is located at 700 L’Enfant Plaza SW, Washington, D.C. For more info visit spymuseum.org
