Duxford Closed ~ Sun 19th Dec 2010

Thus has now been posted on the web front page.

Important Notice
During the current inclement weather we may at short notice either close all or part of the site. To prevent disappointment and inconvenience please phone 01223 835000 to check on the latest situation.

:rolleyes:

Brian

I went to Duxford earlier in the year when it snowed, the website had no notices about closures etc and when we got there the field was shut but you could get into the Shop, restaurant and Airspace which was a bit of a waste of time but we did have air space to ourselves and i got some fantastic pictures.

When i got home i checked the website and they put a notice up about 10.30am which was stupid as if you were going you would be on your way probably by then.

curlyboy

Time for the Harriers one last time to overfly runways and motorways to melt/blow snow and ice away!!

That has been tried and it transpires that after the ice was melted it quickly froze and turned to sheet ice, as a result taxiing back was a little tricky.

I don’t know when or where but I’d love to find out though.

View over a wintery Duxford today from Grange Road…

Duxford’s car park can be one of the coldest places on earth sometimes. I nearly froze to death there one Sunday in December 2004 while waiting for the last bus of the day after the museum had closed. Due to an accident up the motorway the bus never came. After a couple of hours waiting outside in the cold we flagged down someone who was leaving one of the hangars and they made a few calls. After another hour a van arrived and we stuffed everyone in like sardines for the ride to the train station. I climbed in behind the rear seat and sat on the floor with the spare tire, and I was very glad to be there at that point. There wasn’t even any snow on the ground that time, just cold, cold winds.

Peter..the jet powered snow clearers were very effective (called MRD in the RAF) but you had to be very careful – they were extremely powerful and could cause much damage 😀

MRD = Machine Runway Deicer

AKA = Machine Runway Destroyer

I believe several station commanders had the bright idea of using a jet engine, in various ways. Only snag. It doesn’t do the job. The physicists among us should be able to work out the necessary heat required to turn snow into water and steam.

Re clearing snow from runways. In the ’50’s there was great competition among station commanders to keep the runway open come what may. One ’50’s winter at Wattisham there was a decent snowfall. Efforts were made to clear the runway with snowploughs mounted on bowsers, and flying commenced. One of our bright lads did a complete 360 on landing and luckily stayed on the runway, another swung off and sank to its belly in the lovely clay found in that benighted part of Suffolk, so flying was suspended. The runway had got a layer of compacted snow and the groupie decide that a layer of large gravel spread on the snow would be just the job, so the local gravel companies sold him a couple of hundred tons and spread it on the runway.
Lovely, flying recommenced, but that afternoon came a partial thaw and the gravel sunk into the snow. That night it all froze solid, result, no flying.

Every other airfield was open and our man was beside himself. All the aircrew were issued with shovels and carted out onto the runway with orders to dig it out !!!

There was much grumbling and larking about as you may imagine, and the enterprise had to be abandoned at tea break, with a few square yards of runway exposed and the prospect of several weeks more digging. remember the service saying “You shouldn’t have joined if you can’t take a joke”

Pah thats nothing…at dunsfold we used to have this avon powered beast,trundled along courtesy of a Donkey engine and driven by a big lad with BIG arms lol
Now at Brooklands on display

I think based on an old Austin K4 chassis
And with a slightly lower CofG than the soviet trucks,Hmmm their handling must have been ponderous to say the least 😀

Should anyone be thinking of visiting the museum today ……. the visitor car park is closed !

That shouldn’t be a huge problem, I go to look in the hangars, not the car park. :p

I wonder what the reverse VNE is for one of those beasts if you fire it up without remembering to apply the brakes!

Time for the Harriers one last time to overfly runways and motorways to melt/blow snow and ice away!!

Maybe they should invest in a few of these…….

Ken

Time for the Harriers one last time to overfly runways and motorways to melt/blow snow and ice away!!

I think the demands of the Nanchang might be a little less than those of the aircraft using Heathrow…;)

🙂 I would love to see the chaos if hundreds turned up for a flight from there 🙂

Snowbird.

Perhaps the White Waltham P1 is Ace of the base! Rather him/her than me.
Happy landings!!!

Well, White Waltham was open to-day 19 December but only a Nanchang seen active. If a grass airfield can be open, why not Heathrow!

Or maybe WE600!

🙁 I am not surprised,my sister got stranded about 5 miles away,roads off the motorway apparently are lethal.I would think Duxford carpark is suitable for tanks only 🙂