The London Airshow and Yorkshire Airfields

It was quite a hectic weekend for us as we managed to fit in a trip to "Fly" the London Airshow by car and airborne visits to both Sherburn and Sheffield airfields.

It was third time lucky this year as three of our group, myself, Stephen and Niels visited the Earls Court Exhibition Halls on Saturday. I'd been wanting to go for two years but this year I actually made it. We had planned to fly down to Elstree and go into central London on the tube. But it soon became apparant that the weather had other ideas. The visibility was around 4000 metres and the cloud base 700 feet, conditions unsuitable for us to fly in.

So we set off in the car at 8:45 am and got there around 1pm after leaving the car at Tottenham Hale tube station and riding two trains to Earl's Court. Never again. We were tired, hungry and thirsty! Still, after a drink and meal we enjoyed the show and looked around the many exhibits. I was impressed by the Diamond Twin Star. It looked magnificent with its glass panel and shiny paintwork. I made a mental note to check out renewing my multi rating in this fine looking machine.

Here it is looking the bees knees ...

The air show put us in the mood for some flying and by Sunday morning the weather had improved enough for another trip. Me and Steve were tired from the previous day so we decided on a couple of fairly local places to fly into. Any ideas where you might find the sign post in the photo below?

Well it's Sherburn-in-Elmet, a very nice little airfield I've visited many times. It's a good place to take someone for lunch as it's not too far from Barton but far enough to make it a bit of an adventure for a non-flyer's outing. Since my last visit the club house had been refurbished and looked very welcoming and the tuna sandwich and coffee were good.

Stephen spotted a Bell 47 helicopter giving trial lessons and taking students and immediately wanted to fly it. But they couldn't fit him in as they were so busy. I'm sure we're going back again soon so he can get to fly it. The flying club had some brightly painted trainers on display as you can see below.

Here's the new restaurant area at Sherburn. We'll be back again to sample the food.

I flew the arrow from Barton to Sherburn and was also in command for the short hop down to Sheffield City, another great airfield with friendly people and good facilities. We often come to Sheffield as the landing is free if you buy 50 litres of fuel. But this time we had free landing vouchers from the aviation magazines so both Sherburn and Sheffield cost us nothing to use.

Here's the view looking over the Sheffield City apron to the control tower from my vantage point stood on the wing of our aeroplane.

The smart terminal building at Sheffield City is shown below. Inside it's modern and clean and has a good snack bar, an essential requirement for visiting pilots.

From Sheffield we took the long way home which involved flying down to the Trent VOR navigation beacon which is slightly out of our way before turning towards Winsford and going up the Low Level Route back to Barton.

We were both tired now after yesterday's trip to London so called it a day even though I would have liked to call in at Wolverhampton as I still had a free landing voucher for there as well! Best to quit while you're ahead though.

So I'm a bit more pleased as I've managed to fly two weekends in a row. We'll see if that becomes three next week.

A Cold Front Clears The Air

Hopes were high for a flight today but dawn brought low cloud and poor visibility. However, a look at the meterological information predicted that the cold front causing all the problem weather would clear through Barton around 12 o'clock. And that's what happened, so a quick flight was on the cards.

Steve had taken the helicopter home yesterday and was stuck until the weather improved enough for him to make the 25 minute flight back to Barton. I was there raring to go and thought I'd go for a flight before Steve arrived at the airfield. I prepared the aircraft, adding some oil and fuel and just planned to fly wherever the urge took me. There was a nice headwind blowing down Barton's runway 27 right and for once the surface was firm and looked good.

I took off and turned right heading 040 towards the edge of the Manchester Control Zone which is easily spotted by a tower next to a small lake and where the M62 motorway heads off over the penines past Rochdale. I climbed to 1900 feet which is just below the base of controlled airspace in the area north of Barton and headed over towards the penines. I turned left and climbed to 3400 feet heading towards Winter Hill which was clearly defined ahead. I was just under the base of scattered clouds and enjoying myself very much, although it is odd not having someone next to me to talk to.

I could see the coast over towards Southport and headed out there just doing some turns and general handling to get the feel of the plane again. I descended to 2500 feet and reversed course towards Chorley before coming down to 1800 feet in preparation for a return to Barton. Passing The Reebok stadium I was listening to Barton on the radio and discovered the surface wind had increased from a gentle 10 knots down the slot to 330 15 gusting 24knots. It was variable in direction and should not prove to be a problem, it's just that a gusting crosswind can be tricky.

Surprisingly, the Barton circuit was empty and so I joined on a right base for 27 right and although there was some turbulance on final approach, it was not too bad and I made a good landing, even being congratulated by air traffic. That's never happened before, I was half expecting someone to score it out of ten but no further critique was offered.

I had a sandwich in the club house (turkey and stuffing with salad) and then watched Steve's approach in the Enstrom in the gusting wind. A nice approach and a good landing was made, he's pretty good in that machine!

He said the turbulence was high and as the wind was still gusting across the runway we decided against another flight and went for a drink and a chat. We are planning to fly to the London Air Show at Earls Court next Saturday with the train or a car as backup. As usual we are at the mercy of the weather.

And Still The Rain Comes Down ....

This month I've taken four days off work and haven't been able to fly on any of them. It seems that all our web site says is "airfield closed to fixed wing traffic". And so it is again today. The only good news is that now the clocks have gone forward there is more daylight so flying in the evening becomes possible and gives us more opportunities to get airborne. But until the days extend even longer we will have to stay close to home to ensure we get back before last landings. That means close destinations such as Sheffield, which is a friendly and fairly local airport to visit.

This is the airfield earlier today with showers sweeping across every fifteen minutes or so, further soaking the runway and keeping all but one keen helicopter pilot grounded.

The view of Winter Hill to the North kept fading from view as rain lashed the apron and the crosswind reached 15kts. The hanger was full of all the resident aeroplanes, ours included, once again going nowhere!

You can see the control tower in this photograph, a grade two listed building. Work is in progress to restore it. The Piper Warrior in the foreground is a flying club aircraft used for training and pilot hire.

So no flying again today but this bad weather can't continue forever.