If you’re a citizen of Planet Team-BHP, chances are you would have had to be living under a rock these past few years to not know that the iconic Land Rover Defender ended production back in early 2016. (see:
Land Rover Defender production comes to an end).
Land Rover is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year, which is why the company’s Land Rover Classic division, which restores limited edition classic cars made by LR, is re-engineering 150 Defenders and kitting them with a V8 engine (see:
Land Rover to build 150 units of 5.0L V8 Defender).
Auto history buffs and LR / Defender enthusiasts would know that in the summer of 1947 – around the time that India was redeeming its tryst with destiny by awakening to life and freedom – Maurice Wilks (then technical chief of Rover) and his brother Spencer were walking on the vast sands of Red Wharf Bay in Wales, discussing the design weaknesses of the war-surplus Willys Jeep they used on their family farm. Maurice sketched a basic design in the damp sand of a new vehicle that he reasoned could do better. It would offer the benefits of a tractor with on-road usability. It would be a Rover for the land. A Land Rover.
Many years later, to mark the final run of production in 2015, LR went back to where it all started and recreated the unmistakable shape at Red Wharf Bay by using six Defenders to drag agricultural harrows in a continuous 4.52km line (the 1km long drawing was washed away by the tide in minutes).
Earlier this month, after 70 years of all-terrain adventures and global expeditions, LR took the Defender to new heights. It announced the 70th Anniversary celebrations (scheduled for 30 April 2018, but more on that later) by commissioning a spectacular one-off 250m wide Defender outline drawn in the snow at 2,700m in the French Alps.
Snow artist Simon Beck walked out 20,894 steps in sub-zero temperatures as a snowy tribute to the Wilks brothers’ first sketch of the original LR shape in the sand of Red Wharf Bay.
And now, for the main reason behind this post: Land Rover is inviting fans to join the World Land Rover Day celebrations in an online broadcast.
To watch the broadcast and take part in the celebrations, tune into Land Rover’s YouTube channel
www.youtube.com/landrover on 30 April 2018 at 20:00 BST (
1 May 2018 at
00:30 IST) and use the hashtag
#LandRover70Years
Who knows - if the motoring Gods are smiling down upon us, maybe LR will use this webcast to give us a first glimpse of the New Defender?!!!
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