Pembrokeshire Flying Club
Pembrokeshire Flying Club Members out and about this summer TRIM EITM 28th August
Reminder that subs are now due £60
Many Thanks John Fisher
A lucky escape for one pilot after suffering
a total engine failure just north of Bethesda
notice the power lines just to the right !
Pembrokeshire Flying Club Members
Summer visits
Popham EGHP 11th July
Waterford EIWF 17th July
BIRR Ireland EIBR 15th august
EGHE Scilly Isles St Mary's
Four Flying Club members decided to 'do lunch' recently and got together to fly to St Mary's in the Scillies. John and Dave went in their TB10, and Phil and Jim took the Ceesna 172 G-BPWR.
He learnt to fly in the seventies at Carlisle in my former aircraft G-ARFI Cessna 150,
but is now based at White Waltham
Some of the other aircraft sampling Pembrokeshire's wall to wall sunshine this weekend
Pilots from Pembrokeshire Flying Club drove some of the visiting pilots to Haverfordwest town center so that they could explore the town.
EGFE-Movements
A week or so ago, I was approached for my thoughts of the EGFE Movements Web Site, as it happens I quite often skim in and out, to keep in touch with what is going on, on a day to day basis. Callum its founder who quite openly askes for your views with a view to seeking out improvements to make it appear even better. It would appear that a couple of weeks ago he received a rather hostile e-mail accusing him of breaching the official WirelesTelegraphy Act, 1949.and threatening to report him to OFCOM and take court action against him over his listening to and publishing information on his website, where he publishes on a daily basis a general indication of aircraft movements at Haverfordwest EGFE together with the current weather and information of our danger area’s and their activity. Callum was deeply concerned with this sought advice from some of the pilots and operators at Haverfordwest.
My own view being he does a great job, but I thought that it would be wise to seek out the advice from OFCOM to get the official view. I explained the situation to them, and they confirmed as I thought No Problem, I understand that they have also been in touch with Callum to reassure him.
Hanger 4
Martin Stephens of G-CECV RV7 has suffered more punctures in recent weeks than most of us could expect in a lifetime! Martin has suffered 5 punctures since early September when he was taxying out for a flight to Texal in Holland. With the first puncture he put down to a hazard of life, when the second one occurred alarm bells started to ring, followed shortly afterwards by another 3, this must surely be more than a co-incidence ! Martin’s attention now turned to the Hanger 4 floor, and down on his knees, it wasn’t long before he found a piece of wire type metal protruding up out of the floor, then another, and another, it was soon obvious that large area’s of the floor were showing signs of metal contamination protruding up out of the floor.
Further investigation reveals that Dave and Mark had suffered punctures shortly after taxying out on 2 occasions in the last two years, whilst the helicopter that had occupied the corner of the Hanger had suffered 4 punctures , and the Aerodrome Fire Engine that also utilises the hanger, whilst on its annual inspection was found to have metal contamination to its tyres.
I believe that the company responsible for the laying of the floor have been carrying out an investigation in the hanger this week.
September 2009
Drone Crashes on take off at Aberporth
THIS IS YOUR AIRSPACE OR AT LEAST WAS !
John's Blog
Saturday 8th August saw Martin Stevens, Garry Walters, John Fisher and David Chamberlin depart for the Irish Light Aviation Society's Annual fly in at SAAC Field just east of Waterford. on their arrival they where met with a ceiling of approx 600' SAAC field boasted a 600 m grass strip that fell away from the Northern end. Some 20 or so aircraft ranging from girocopters to piper Cubs, tiger moth a bellanca cruisemaster and of course the two RV7's from the Pembrokeshire Flying Club, we were met by malcolm evans with his dog that he was baby sitting over the weekend he very kindly supplied the wheels over the weekend, and drove us down to the local supermarket so that we could purchase some wine and beer for the evening bbq back at the strip later that evening
with a roasd pig and roast potatoes for the main course, it was nice to have a chance to have a aviation chat with fellow pilots over a glass or two ( or even 3 )
We were invited the next day to fly up to a strip at Newcastle about 30 miles south of Dublin elv 1 foot! were we were met once again by malcolm this time with fergus to drove us to a local village for sunday lunch, back at newcastle we met the owner of the strip who would not take any payment for or landing fee or coffee so we left a small donation at the onsite cafe, we departed for Haverfordwest following the coast until we were able to take a direct route back home without entering R201 Aberporth that had been notified as active
we pose for a picture before our departure from Newcastle
All in all a great weekend even if the weather could have been kinder, we are looking forward to returning again next year, this time with a few extra pilots from Pembrokeshire Flying Club
Great New Weather site:www.weatheronline.co.uk give it a go and thank's to Mark
Vans Club de France Fly In
St Brieuc
For Full report see top left
KNOCK FLY IN
members of Pembrokeshire flying Club formate for a photo call in the hanger in the background is the RV6 (mad cow) built and flown by Gerry Humphreys
Saturday May 2nd a party of members from Pembrokeshire Flying Club (Mark, Martin, Rodney, Mike, Malcolm and myself) assembled for a trip to Knock (Ireland) for their fly in. The weatherman had arranged some nice weather including a tailwind to help us on our way. We made the short crossing, in my case via Tusker Rock, in some 23 minutes. From there we set our heading to Ballyhaunis on the edge of Connaught Control Zone. This was to be my first long cross country flight across mid Ireland. Rodney, my navigator was kept busy plotting our progress and keeping us on track and time, as we had entered the arrival time competition attached to the fly in. We had estimated that we needed to arrive at Ballyhaunis at 11:53 to allow another 7 minutes to our timed arrival of 12:00. As we passed the peat bogs to the south of Athlone we had calculated that we were a little early and so slowed down a touch. We identified a lot of Bally’s in this area, Ballygar, Ballymoan and shortly had Ballyhaunis in sight. When we signed off from Shannon to talk to Knock we had another 2 or 3 aircraft ahead of us and as we positioned ourselves for left hand downwind to 27, were asked to touchdown opposite the fire engine. On touching down we were given a landing time of 12:00:18 and a very warm welcome to Knock. We then taxied down the looooong runway (over 2500 m I believe) at the end of which we turned right and were marshalled in line with other aircraft that had just landed.
Once out of the aircraft we were welcomed by Breeda the flying club co-coordinator and went to book in and have a welcome cup of tea and a cake. Warming up on the tarmac was Dave Bruton in his Sukoi who went on to give a fine aerobatic display. After this we walked up to the terminal building where there was to be some evening entertainment and food later. We thought that we had better sample some of the local brew before making our way back to the club hanger and awaiting our transport to our relevant accommodation in Charlestown. On the way I enquired with our taxi driver as to where the best Guinness was served and he pointed out 2 bars, well to be perfectly correct 1 bar and 1 hardware shop! Once settled in our accommodation it seemed only right that we sampled the local Guinness, and so towards the hardware shop we headed. We entered and asked for the bar and were pointed in the direction of a door in the back of the shop! This led into 2 small crowded rooms where most of the locals seemed to be following the form of horses in their newspapers. Malcolm mentioned that a rugby match was due to start and we asked if we could change channels to watch The Munster / Lienster match. Well the Guinness seemed to go down quite well there with the exception of Rodney who was on the red wine. We all trundled back to our accommodation for a quick wash and brush up before our taxi arrived to take us back to the airport. We were by this time joined by Fergus and friends and I think now numbered 8.
the pretty village of Charlestown
The main terminal building previously frequented by passengers was now quite well attended by pilots and friends and a small Irish group played in the background. Suitably refreshed with drinks, the hot food was now readily welcomed. We were entertained with some Irish dancing by a six year old girl, who I believe was a local champion, followed by more music and some presentations. By now it had turned 11 o’clock and we still had one bar to explore in Charlestown! By 2:30 Martin and I were feeling peckish and as the Local Chinese stayed open till 3:00 we thought that we had better give it a go.
As next morning was a bright sunny one I decided to get up early and have a walk around the town and take some pictures. About an hour later I was joined by most of the others and we made our way back for some breakfast. Later back at the airport we learned that our host had funded 50% of our taxi costs. What a pleasant surprise!
It was starting to cloud up a bit by 10:30 and I decided to have my flight plan brought forward an hour but Shannon could not find it! Got onto London to have it re-submitted and brought forward to 11:15 UTC. Our outbound journey was only 1:20 and we had enough fuel for our return journey. After taking off and setting our heading for Tusker Rock the Air Traffic made a request for my ground speed. “191 kts” I replied! Wow, a tail wind all the way home so we had a pleasant return journey and arrived back at Haverfordwest at 13:30 local. All in all 2:45 there and back and tanks topped out with 87 liters which makes 31.6 liters per hour. And thank you tailwind.
What a great weekend.
John Fisher
many thanks to my proof reader Judy