Civilian Aviation

Saturday 30th June. A fine sunny day. Not too windy at start. A venue that I normally like.
But this year, sadly, it felt lacking. It just did not seem to attract the aircraft visitors.
Full credit to Air Britain, and all the volunteers involved. Great that they organise this.
This year was recognising anniversaries for the Harvard and Cessna 170. Saturday, I saw one of each.
AB really make an effort for anniversaries each year, by contacting and inviting operators of that type.
It must be so disappointing for the team.
Also this year - the hangar restrictions were tighter than last year. No chance to check on many based aircraft.
Still, I enjoyed a day out, and give my thanks to the AB team.

So first the Harvard. G-BJST

NA Harvard RAF AJ841 G-BJST North Weald 027

Cessna 170 G-EEVY

Cessna 170 G-EEVY North Weald 005



A regular but a nice aircraft G-HARY Aircoupe

Alon A-2 Aircoupe G-HARY North Weald 062

Yak 12 G-PFKD

Yak 12 G-PFKD North Weald 057


PA-28RT PH-TWP

PA-28RT PH-TWP North Weald



Another rare type - Ryan Navion N4956C

Ryan Navion USAAC 60344 N4956C North Weald 031

Based for a while for airshows are the two Norwegian Vampires. In RAF colours this season.


DH115 Vampir RAF WZ447 LN-DHZ North Weald 022


DH100 Vampire RAF VZ305 LN-DHY North Weald 021


The based Douglas C-54 N44914


Douglas C-54D USAF 56498 N44914 North Weald 014

Finally, helimed operated twice. AW-169 G-HHEM


AW-169 G-HHEM North Weald 033


Hope you enjoy looking
Pete.

Lovely colourful mix in some great light.

Good set. Glad I wasn't the only one dissapointed by attendence. According to the Air Britain staff I spoke to, there was a better attended fly-in/show at Headcorn. I don't think Air Britain helped themselves by demanding a PPR slot, but then not updating the website, which still shows 2017 details.

I think the PPR slots were the same as last year, decided by North Weald, who only have A/G comms plus the fact that their CTZ is very very close to Stansted's airspace

Last year someone mentioned looking at Rougham for this years event

Great pictures thanks for sharing with us all.

Bob

New to the group, but a "watcher" for some time. First thanks to London Eye for some great pictures at North Weald.

In my capacity of the Air-Britain Fly-In Director I would just like to take the opportunity come back and clarify some of the points made by ACW367.

- The event referred to which could have impacted on ours may have been Country Fair Fly-In at Heveningham Hall, Suffolk, which attracted about 80 visiting aircraft on Saturday. Headcorn did have an airshow but I doubt that had much impact on the A-B Fly-In event, other than precluding two Harvards from potentially attending. We always have the challenge of other events taking place simultaneously and there is rarely a weekend between May and September when there is nothing on.

- Regarding the the website being dated for 2017, Air-Britain changed its website earlier this year and the new site (http://air-britain.com/web/flyin/) had full details about the event on it. It sometimes pays to check you are not using and old URL link.

- In respect of PPR slot bookings, these have to be used as they are a mandatory operating procedure for North Weald Airfield. After the problems which occurred in 2017 we actually quadrupled the number of slots available in 2018, so there was no impact this year caused by PPR slot allocations.

- The A-B team like many were also disappointed on the volume of visitors and have identified a raft of issues that may have impacted on attendance ranging including 8.33khz radio changes, challenging airspace requirements, the heat, cross winds and sea fog (we know that 4 aircraft from Holland and France diverted to local airfields rather than cross the Channel) and the World Cup. We cannot force pilots to attend and certainly do not have funding to offer attractions and incentives on the same scale that Heveningham Hall did.

It has already been agreed that Air-Britain will not be holding a Fly-In at North Weald in 2019. Other locations are being considered, but as the event has only once covered its costs in 39 years a decision to go-ahead in 2019 will be taken by the Air-Britain Trust's Board later this year.

Thanks for all of you who did attend.

G-APDK
Air-Britain Fly-In Director