Phil Perry

You need this stuff Mate. . .

Did my Air/ Ground radio stint all day today. . .9 am to 6 PM. . . been otherwise occupied last week, and no one told me about the shenanigans. Incident #1. Lady driver on the M6 motorway, next to our site, phones the airfield number and leaves a message to say : a ' Low Flying Plane', "That only missed my car by a few feet". . . "It frightened me to death and I had my kids in the car and it made me swerve I was so shocked. . ." I saw it clearly in front of me, and it had TWO engines on the front. . ." "It happened as it was just getting dark" Our site is very small, by light aircraft standards, and No one has ever landed a twin, nor taken off in one, the whole time that the airfield has been in existence. it just isn't big enough. I have to assume that this was a joke message. it is now 2130 and it has just going dark. Our Ops finish at 20 00 hrs, last take off which at this time of the year is still broad daylight. I will treat this with the contempt it deserves . . . unless perhaps some Hoon in a twin did a a low flyby after everyone had gorn home. . .who knows. .. ?. TODAY ( Sunday 12th May ) we had quite a busy day but the first thing I was told was that one of our resident pilots had over run Rwy 25L in his Skyranger 912 ( 80HP ) had, on Friday, landed his machine Way too fast, and Way too deep into the strip and ran off the end,. . over the gravel vehicle track, and into a deep ploughed field. . . .and that the Aircraft is a total write off. ( Video available soon ) Again, today, a Dynaero Ban Bi, which is a composite aircraft, was given the duty runway, the longest ( 25L ) but for some reason landed on the Shortest (29L ) which is only 220 metres.. . . I told him that he was lined up on the short runway and he did not respond. . . .He continued with the landing, touching down with around 90 metres left. He 'Shimmied about' trying to stop, (Brakes don't work that well on damp grass. . .) and managed to do so with the aircraft finishing the run 20 metres beyond the runway, crossing the taxiway and vehicle track, and just running into the ploughed field beyond by around 3 metres. . .No Damage. but why ffs ? ( Pics of the aircraft available soon ) Makes yer wonder dunnit ?. . . the Pilot apologised and said that he mis-read the runway number and had never flown in before. . . We are listed in around four National airfield guides, and have a website full of useful, pictorial information for all the runways. . . . Mind you, to be perfectly fair here, I KNOW people who shouldn't be allowed near a bloody CAR either. . . .

OK Mate. . . . If I ever get to AUSTRALIA again,. . .I'll have LOADS of folks to look up. . YAY ! Don't mind a cold beer on a hot day, but I DO prefer WINE,. . .sparkling, and as dry as possible. Knew a supermarket wine rep who used to flog me the odd spare bottle of Champers from the Barossa. . . If I took him flying occasionally . . luvly stuff. . . Cava from that region is nice, and not as tarty s stuff we get here in the UK. . . looking forward to doing a trade deal if we get around to clearing out the Parliament and stringing all those duplicitous lying barstards up with piano wire from lamp posts along the river Thames. . .unless they give us what we voted for. . ( Another story for a different forum matey. . . )

I was lucky in OZ that I knew silly people who would lend me stuff. . .( ! ) I met a US Air force (Retired) bloke at a pub, we got talking and he was a Harley / Indian fan and he said he'd bought a British Vincent 998 Black Diamond and had it shipped from the UK. ( It wasn't. . it was a Black Shadow ) He asked me If I could Ride / deliver it from Adelaide to Brisbane. Which I did. . . Jesus it was a right bloody animal to start, with the advance and retard lever on the bars, which if you got this wrong, would kick an elephant over the front ( It Did, only I was quite Lithe and athletic back then ) . . . that thing could literally Out-accelerate ANYTHING on the road at the time, but it was a bit hairy, and I nearly lost it with tank slappers on a couple of occasions. . Next job ( 4 months later ) was to fetch one of the first ever Honda 750/4 machines from Brisbane to Melbourne. ( For a mate of the yank) This bloke was like Milo Minderbinder from Catch 22. . .bought and sold all manner of stuff. . . better keep the rest of THOSE stories for the pub I think. . .. Especially the Aeroplane one. . ( Taps Nose ) Last fuel stop before Melb was at an Ampol service station at Wangaratta. . . several local yokels meandered over to have a look at the Honda, inspecting it all over. "Ey mate, Can we have a go ?" they asked. . .I said No. . Eff Off, It ain't mine sunshine. "Where's the kickstart ?" they asked,. . I showed them the button. . . . They were horrified. . ."Electric Start ? ? ? ? . .You Wusss" Dunno whether they Really though that I was a Wusss, or because I told them to Eff Off. . . Oh well. . . I didn't end up bruised anyhow Probably because My arms made me look like a weightlifter, thanks to the Vincent workout. . .( Strange Place Wang. . .) My apologies to any Wangers on here,. .. no offence intended. . .

I'm not up to Peter's standard in Guessing that plane stuff,. .. but I KNOW a Hurricane when I see one, but I dunno where it came from, it Could have been the BBMF one, but I only saw the bugger for around 12 seconds,. . . I think there is one at BREIGHTON airfield, 6 nm east of Selby power station cooling towers in Yorkshire. . . there are plenty of Old aircraft at that place,. including a couple of Mustangs, YAKs and some Brit built 1940s / 50s aircraft that I hadn't even heard of. . .etc. . .worth visit if you ever get over here. . Lots of Spits in the UK now, not sure how many exactly, but HURRIBIRDS are very rare. . . .

Amazing it IS indeed. . the week before (Practice week ) is also great. . . It's fun learning all the little back roads to get around the island when the circuit is active. . . I stopped riding on 'Mad Sunday' though. . .bloody suicide mate. . . Mountain was open BOTH Ways until recently. . .loads of casualties. . .it's bad enough when it's ONE Way !. . . it's also a damn shame that so many riders ( and some spectators ) get killed every year. IOM is one of the most dangerous tracks in the world. . . A bale of hay in front of a dry stone wall don't help much if you hit it at 380+kph on a bike. . . #EDIT I gave up bikes in 2009 after being knocked off it and bouncing along the tarmac on me arris for about the fifth time. . .repaired it ( VFR750 ) and flogged it to a mate in Spain. . . . tearful but necessary. . . then in Dec '09 some drunken Git hit me head on and destroyed my work van. . . . another sad story for another time perhaps. . . Wow ! ! ! Had to go and look outside,. . . Hawker Hurricane just flew overhead at around 1,000 ft agl. . . Can't mistake the sound of that Merlin !

Traditional elixir for any occasion in Russia ?

Detrimental comments by Airline pilots in the UK. . . ( I have not bothered to look at PPRuNe. . .(this is just from the group that I now personally apart from ONE. . . but he is an ordained Churchman too. . ( ! ) sigh) 'Incompetent' too high ROD. . etc Flight Crew incompetent . . .etc. . . WHY do they do this before any investigation is carried out ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? The only blokes who know what happened in that incident are the flight crew for Fecks sake.

Oh bother,. . .having probs posting. . . Might have to do it later. . . . OH,. .. 'Ang on a Mo,. . . [TABLE] [TR] [TD] [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] [TABLE] [TR] [TD]A word for our sponsors: 'Our sponsors' are the pilots reading this. We ask, if you can, to help us in the production of this monthly summary of safety information and generally in our work of saving lives in UK GA. A subscription to the print magazine GASCo Flight Safety would show your support and reading it might save you from an unpleasant experience in the future. It's only £16 p.a. for a direct debit subscriber. SUBSCRIBE [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] MUCH BETTER! [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] Thankfully, the AAIB bulletin for last month reported on no fatal accidents to UK GA. There is a Correspondence Report of the crash of a Cessna 414 light twin into a poultry shed at Enstone. Loss of power was experienced after take off and the AAIB comments, ... the most likely cause of the left engine stopping during the aborted take off, and the right engine stopping during the accident flight, was a disruption in the fuel supply between the fuel tanks and engine fuel control units. The pilot appears to have kept control all the way down to the poultry shed and he and his passenger suffered minor injuries. READ MORE [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] AIRPROXES [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] [TABLE] [TR] [TD] The Board's airprox of the month concerns a Twin Comanche whose pilot was distracted by a side door springing open on climb out. There was a close encounter with a PA-28 in the circuit and the Board suggests that a PAN call could have alerted other traffic to the pilot's difficulties, however manageable. For the instructor commanding the PA-28 the suggestion is that the lesson is probably not to assume that other pilots are as competent, current or coping as well as he might. READ MORE [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]

Wouldn't argue with you Sir. As I said in the original post, I picked this photo from a Twitter site, of a guy who likes OLD photographs.. . .I will send him your thoughts on this ( with your permission of course ) He got the Airfield right though,. . . I mean the one quoted by Peter, ie RAF Kirton-in-Lindsey in Lincs. Simon's site is Tunnelbreeze.com, Twitter Only from what I can gather,. . and he gave me permission to copy / paste the picture. He has an 'Aviation' section, which I will check out later. I briefly saw one of those it was a Biplane taken in the 1920s - 30s with a bloke and a Lion cub on the wing. . ( ? ) captioned 'Flying Circus' He has an eclectic taste in Photographs, Anyone recall the Brit TV show 'Coronation Street' in the seventies ? It was on TV when Wifey and I lived in Melbourne. . .although the plots were around four years behind the UK. . . Again, it ha been digitally colourized. . . Violet Carson ( AKA Ena Sharples, overlooking Old Trafford - Manchester , circa 1960 ) Phil.

Thanks mate,. .I was going to Wiki the Sqn but was forced to go down to the pub by one of them Flying Ace blokes as it was his Birthday. . . ( just got back but was expecting one of you Ne'er do wells to check out that Squadron. . .you guys rarely fail to impress me with your diligence and attention to detail. . . .) The 'Birthday Boy' was a veteran of the Falklands war, . . a 36 year old Ex-Harrier pilot who shot down 3 Pucaras, and damaged one Super Etendard which crashed into the sea. The Brits were able to save the ejected Argie pilot, as he ditched only a few miles out from Port Stanley. . .matey was pleased that he had survived. I first met him at the Isle of Man TT races, in the early 1990s when, after flying in, in his Dad's ultralight , he foolishly agreed to sit pillion on a Triumph Rocket three, three cylinder 2.3 litre bike behind me. . . in order to carry the flying club's order back to the camp from Ramsey to Andreas Airfield from the Chinky and Curry shop in Ramsey ( seven miles ) which we accomplished in four minutes, . . with yours truly riding like an absolute nutter, and him hanging on for dear life on the pillion. . .( don't worry the bike had a substantial backrest for the passenger) . . .he said he'd never been so terrified in his life. . .( I hope you're listening, you Argie Pilots ) I can truthfully say, that this was the ONLY genuine British fighter pilot that I have ever frightened. #Edit. . I forgot to mention that he is now flying Airliners, and that his wife is also a senior first officer on a different airline, , ( Both Airbus, him A-340 and her A-320 ) I wonder what they talk about after hours .... ?

I was browsing twitter for some sensible content ( difficult - a little like Herding Cats. . .) This shows some members of 342 Squadron Royal Australian Air Force, taken at an Airfield near to Lincoln in 1941. The pic has been digitally colourised. I don't know any history of this squadron, nor whether they were Fighter or Bomber command. ( I'll keep looking )

Nice one mate. . . well done. I did part of my Night rating in a Beechcraft Sundowner, which I think is fairly similar. . . .when I was flying from YMMB. I couldn't complete it in that aircraft though, as an instructor at the school had a major blue with his girlfriend,. . got ratted and took the sundowner out on a night flight where he flew around and in between the tall buildings in Melbourne city, and finally landed it half intact at Moorabbin, but the wings were bent and overstressed, so gawd knows what he had been doing with it in the dark. I have told this story before on this site, but long ago. . . During the investigation it turned out that the same bloke had been sitting Commercial Pilot examinations for other pilots for cash.. . .Oh dear. . .I only flew with him Once on my first attempt at Night circuiits at YMMB. . and he seemed a nice enough chap. You never Know. . .A lot of men have been swerved from the straight and narrow by Women, Strong Drink and filthy lucre it seems. . .

Thanks Peter,. . I DO know this, but what I was getting at is that flying GA in Australia at the time I did, no one I knew ever mentioned the ICAO codes, unless it was for filling out a flight plan. . .I always went on Sartime. . .never filed a plan although I was taught how. Ony used them in the UK when GPS became available to us unwashed Plebs for entering into the satnav so that it knew where you wanted to go. . . . .in the early days, I had a Garmin GPS 12 hand held unit. . .which got us out of trouble when I was right seat pax with a mate in his Piper Arrow 3 on the way to the TT races in the Isle of Man. . he flew into the haze over the Irish sea and became UOP ( Uncertain of position ! ) and I found that if he slowed the aeroplane down to just under 100 Kts, that the GPS would actually work ! (It was limited to 99Kt ) which was pretty lucky as the viz got worse, and we didn't see Ronaldsway Airport until we were midpoint downwind Rwy 26/08, but still at 3,000 ft. . . I had memorized the ICAO locator code following previous visits there, using the mnemonic EG Norton Suzuki EGNS. . . Just in case you think my mate Mick was a derroe,. . the aids at EGNS were not working. . the VOR / DME was offline and it was VFR or nothing.

I agree entirely about the choice of Instructor ! but to be fair, I've only had what I could describe as a poor one,. . .he was newly qualified and, from what I could see, was attempting to mark his superiority by criticizing Everything that I did. He didn't say, "Why don't you try doing it like this" or anything helpful at all. On a crosswind takeoff, he grabbed the yoke of the 182 without any 'I have control' niceties and said I needed some hours of practice before he would sign me off. This was a biennial review by the way, and after an hour of this I felt quite deflated ! He refused to sign my logbook. I admit that I hd not flown a C-182 since I left Australia six years previously, but I did tell him that at the outset. I was very busy workwise at the time, so didn't pursue the reval until a month later. I Booked another reval at an airfield near where I was working away in the South of England. I got a Lady Instructor, in her mid forties I'd guess. What a breath of fresh air she was ! Bloody heck, she made me feel so comfortable, utterly no nonsense professional. We flew their C-210 as it was the only thing available on the day. She looked at my logbook and said, let's go an fly around a bit, then we'll do some stuff under the hood. We flew out of Southampton Airport and tracked down the coast for a short while, allowing me to do all the radio calls etc. She then asked me if it would be OK if we landed at Sandown, on the Isle of Wight so she could have a word with someone there. I was enjoying this as she was good company and we had some good banter. When we got back to Southampton, she signed me off straight away. She had been asking some good questions as we flew, but not trying to trip me up. . .On the whole it was the most enjoyable reval I'd ever had. I found out later that she occasionally flew a 2 seat spitfire out of Popham as well. . . Jeeze, I would have loved to have done the reval in THAT ! though I doubt if I could have afforded the Avgas !. . . *Edit - I forgot to mention after departing sandown, she stuck me under the hood and made me fly back to long final on the clocks . . I had an I/R anyway so that wasnt a problem, but a bit scary when you're being given all the headings and data by the right seat passenger !

YAY ! ! ! ! I Guessed YBDG ! ! ! ! when I flew there a few times, nobody used 'Y' codes. . . ( 1972 - 75 ) I guessed YMMB too, but others are not so easy peasy. Being a total Pillock I once landed at Bendigo in a C-210 with a couple of Pommie convicts with whom I had shared a dining room table on the convict ship. I called the tower guy / FSO while still ten NM out. . . but he had gone for a coffee break. I misread the windsock slightly . . by 180 degrees and the tyres screeched a bit on touchdown, as one might expect when landing with a 17Kt tailwind.. I put this down to yabbering to the guest victims instead of bloody concentrating on the job. On the plus side,. . .I NEVER EVER landed downwind again. ?

I love some of the French road signs . . .they are 'Animated' showing that there is a sudden bend ahead,. . . followed by a steep descent. . . INCREDIBLY USEFUL ON A BIKE. . .never seen these anywhere else in the world. . . I also appreciated the black painted metal 'Human' sized figures mounted at the side of the roads,. . indicating where someone had died . . .made you Think. . . French Black tops are the smoothest roads that I HAVE EVER RIDDEN ON. . .

These AAIB Bulletins are very surgical and thorough. If you don't wish further issues posted, please Let me know. Phil P

( This GASCo report includes a link to the AAIB Accident report listing, 3 - 2019 ( press 'READ MORE' Twice for the full AAIB report ) MORE LOSS OF CONTROL FATALITIES - TWO FIXED WING AND ONE ROTARY, PLUS ONE UNUSUAL FATAL ACCIDENT TYPE As always it's Loss Of Control (LOC) that kills most of us. For fixed wing it's usually a loss of flying speed at low level and for rotary it's usually pressing on in difficult weather into inadvertent IMC. The March AAIB bulletin reports the deaths of three pilots and one passenger and the serious injury of another passenger in these all too familiar circumstances. READ MORE

Email reply : Red Arrow under Pier Inbox x roger yersin <[email protected]> 08:35 (3 hours ago) to me Hi Phil, Yes it is photoshopped, wish it was real. Paignton pier is not very tall and the Hawk wouldn't fit under it. Thank you for your interest Cheers Roger YERSINimages At least he's honest about it ! ! !

Emailed Roger Kersin Photograpy ( Devon UK ) and asked if the date of the alleged picture, ie April Ist, had any bearing at all. ie, Jolly Good Jape ?. . . No response from his 'Contact Us' page. . . Been 5 days now.

Painful both Physically and financially,. . .but at least the Pilot has survived.

I am not saying that this is true Marty. Perhaps you should take it up with the people concerned. . . If it IS a true photograph. . .,. . then my comment above still stands.. Unnecessary and Bloody stupid in the utter extreme. I am not in the least interested in various Photoshop arguments either. I shall email the Red Arrows Publicity people and ask the appropriate question.