RAF Vulcan and other Zabbar, Malta General Tips

Favorite Thing: The mention of Vulcan Avro may evoke emotional feelings in Zabbar, since in the seventies the City was witness to a horrifying accident involving that aircraft.

Around a regular midday in 1975, a RAF Vulcan Avro crashed smack in the middle of Zabbar, with parts ending far apart, in fields beyond residential areas but also in the school courtyard.

If you are the kind of person to do it, do start the conversation with locals, especially the older ones, who will tell you the story in finest details, invoking the Madonna over and over again, stressing the fact that there being only one casualty (exept the aircraft crew) was a matter of divine intervention...

Remains of the crashed aircraft are on display in the Sanctuary Museum.


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Favorite Thing: The name Zabbar comes from a sector of workers that traditionally lived in the area. Through the ages, the Maltese word inzabbar became corrupted into the City's name.

The work carried out, or iz-zabra literally means 'to groom trees'. In fact, although not historically proven, it is thought that the City was the tree groomers' living quarters on the Maltese Islands. Another hypothesis is that there were very few tree groomers, the best of which lived in the area (and subsequently became known after him (or her?)). The third hypothesis is that the people of what became later known as Zabbar introduced the practice of tree grooming to Malta. All are plausible enough given the City's proximity to the fortified historic Cities around Zabbar.

What is a fact, though, is that the city's motto is up to this very day Cadeo et Augeo, or 'Groom and Cultivate'.


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