What's on your doorstep

Panshanger is a couple of miles from me and i am about 25 miles from Duxford, Old Warden and Hendon-i would be about 5 miles from the old de Havilland factory if it were still there -interestingly, the main building has just been restored and reopened as the Hatfield Police Station ! (At least it wasn’t demolished)-i recently re-discovered the de Havilland Heritage Museum about 10 miles away (home to the prototype Mosquito)-fascinting place

Driving west from home I’ve got Shoreham , north west(ish) and I’ve got Coolham ALG), due north it’s Chailey ALG, north east to Ringmer gliding strip, and Deanland ALG (part of which is still an operational airfield). Due east will bring me to Friston ALG, and south will take me to Tidemills and Newhaven, from where WW1 seaplanes were operated.

Within about 100yds of where my house now stands is the site of a BofB 109 crash landing, the (former) racecourse above the town was where Tom Gleave force-landed his Hurricane. A Stirling crashed on some allotments in town. A C-47 also came to grief about a mile away during WW2, and a string of bombs fell along one of the town’s streets, and there’s another beleived to be lying under one corner of the town’s public garden – it continually sank into the soil when they tried to dig/recover it at the time, so it is said that they gave up trying, and laid concrete over the top.

Plenty of aviation history to keep me occupied then!

And within an hour or so’s drive then there’s a whole host of other places, Tangmere, Funtingdon, Ford, Appledram, Selsey, Dunsfold, Farnborough, Hartford Bridge Flats (Blackbushe), Gatwick, Croydon, Brooklands, Kenley, Biggin Hill, Gravesend, Detling, Rochester, West Malling, Headcorn, Hythe/Dungeness (sound mirrors)……roll on retirement, I don’t think I’ll be bored :D.

Paul F

Had a very nice display by a Harvard this afternoon.

I saw the Harvard from Sainsbury’s car park (Chichester) and commented at the time that he looked a bit low for the manouevres he was pulling.. nice sound though.. 😎

Cheers Baz
It was driving me nuts not knowing what it was!
Regards
Atr42

Fox and Tangmere have just about summed up what we have around here.
Only thing I can add is the small private strip by Washington VRP. Whoever owns that has some friends with some very interesting aircraft, some of which I don’t know.
Recently had a single engine low wing mono plane with tri tail and invasion markings flying around. No idea what it is. Had a very nice display by a Harvard this afternoon. Quite often have a small bi plane practising aerobatics in the area.
Add that to the bits and pieces we see that are obviously out of Shoreham and I think I’m very lucky to live where I do.:)
PS If anyone wants to offer a flight in any of the above I’ll try very hard to persuade the missus allow me to part with some cash!

Hi ATR
Presumably a Miles Messenger…very pretty…recent thread here…

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=86342&highlight=miles+messenger

regards baz

Edwards AFB, AF Plant 42 & a few places that *don’t exist*

Oh, please do tell…

I’m still trying to find out where the USAF/CIA operate their stealth V/STOL tactical transport aircraft from in the UK? You know, that black triangle that flies only at night and when over populated areas it switches on these bright lights so that those below think it’s a UFO, flown by ET.

Apparently it was designed in the wake of the failed rescue attempt to free US hostages in Iran 30 years ago.

Fox and Tangmere have just about summed up what we have around here.
Only thing I can add is the small private strip by Washington VRP. Whoever owns that has some friends with some very interesting aircraft, some of which I don’t know.
Recently had a single engine low wing mono plane with tri tail and invasion markings flying around. No idea what it is. Had a very nice display by a Harvard this afternoon. Quite often have a small bi plane practising aerobatics in the area.
Add that to the bits and pieces we see that are obviously out of Shoreham and I think I’m very lucky to live where I do.:)
PS If anyone wants to offer a flight in any of the above I’ll try very hard to persuade the missus allow me to part with some cash!

On my doorstep this morning was a half empty can of falling down water and the remains of a kebab meat and chips. I know the culprit well so was able to return them via his letterbox.

Aviation wise? Suppose closest to home was the factory which was bombed a couple of hundred yards from my home. I believe none of the bombs exploded but the impact caused a partial collapse of the building and some of the workers were crushed. Family story is that my paternal Grandfather was one of the fire watchers involved in the rescue effort. Must do more research into that.

Next would be the Cenotaph in Walsall. This was erected on the site of a bomb crater. On the night of 31st January/1st February 1916 a Zeppelin, L21, was out to attack Merseyside. In the fog of that night he thought he had found his target. The river identified by the crew was not the Mersey but the labyrinth of waterways which criss cross the Black Country. Tipton and Darlaston were both hit, including a Church. Several bombs fell across Walsall town centre and one landed outside the Science and Arts institute in Bradford Street. It was shrapnel from this bomb which caused the deaths of three people. Most prominent among them was the Lady Mayoress, Mary Julia Slater, who died several weeks later as a result of severe injury to her chest and abdomen. I’ve not seen it but I believe this story was featured in Ian Hislop’s programme, Not Forgotten.

The site of Walsall Aerodrome still exists, with a couple of original buildings, and is a leisure site. I often walk the dog on there. It has a bit of a wartime history as a repair centre for some aircraft, mainly single engined. I suspect there is a lot more information in one of Alec Brew’s publications. I believe Amy Johnson flew from there at some point.

Moving further afield is the Boulton Paul Museum in Wolverhampton, Cosford, the former Wellington OTU at Fradley, MAM at Coventry, the Hall of Memory in Birmingham. The German Military Cemetery at Cannock Chase contains the graves of Zeppelin crews from the Great War and Luftwaffe aircrew from the Battle of Britain and later.

Regards,

kev35

Funnily enough……..:diablo::D;)

How about this?

Literally on my doorstep….!

Its a boot scraper made many moons ago from a piece of armour plate taken from a Dornier 17 downed near my home in September 1940. Not made by me, but by the farmer on who’s land it crashed.

Inscription in the concrete base reads:

“PART OF DORNIER BROUGHT DOWN SEPT 1940”

Sure its not from a 109 Andy ??
Would be worth putting on ebay…little bit of dulux etc 😀

How about this?

Literally on my doorstep….!

Its a boot scraper made many moons ago from a piece of armour plate taken from a Dornier 17 downed near my home in September 1940. Not made by me, but by the farmer on who’s land it crashed.

Inscription in the concrete base reads:

“PART OF DORNIER BROUGHT DOWN SEPT 1940”

😀

Two tubs of winter flowering Pansy’s. Well you did ask. 🙂

John

In the the best traditions of Captain Mainwaring “I spotted that joke some time ago, I wondered who’d be be first to point it out”:D

Somebody get him his coat!:;)

I started life not far from Northolt(where my dad was stationed at one time during WW2). Used to visit regularly to watch the planes & go to the Polish memorial. Family then moved close to Woodley. Early teens I used to cycle to the airfield & rummage through the ‘rubbish’. Brought home many old spark plugs and other bits. Unfortunately not much left now. Later on it became a good place for courting and dances held in the control tower building. Not much left now, turned over to housing. Good museum though. Another one is Ascot race course which was, I believe, a landing ground for American light aircraft, and White Waltham, still very much in use.

A whole string of relatively little known aviation connections to Nottinghamshire:

Alms Houses erected in memory of Albert Ball VC in the shadow of Nottingham Castle that houses a statue in his memory in the grounds and displays his flying tunic in the Castle Museum. This latter item is on loan from 56(R) Squadron.

Over at Hucknall a variety of items connected to Rolls-Royce including the Flying Bedstead public house.

Across at Langar the British Parachute Centre, a smart Squadron memorial and the remains of the former Avro Factory that undertook a lot of maintenance work including the Shackleton phase upgrades.

2 minutes up the road is the London Gliding Club. It has a few vintage gliders and a trailer made from part of the fuselarge of the Tyne powered Lincoln. Go in the other direction and I have the Eaton Bray airstrip, With a vintage glider repair workshop near by. Cheddington is about 15 minutes away. Luton Airport isnt far. Old Warden about 40 minutes. Woburn Park is just under 20 minutes and if you know where to look you can still find small bits of Stirling bombers that where cut up there.

Dave

How can i forget those, im about 40 mins from the London Gliding club to.

I work at the “Second oldest continuously operating general aviation airport” in the United States – Stinson Field in San Antonio. Pretty neat. Randolph AFB is near where we live and there are a bunch of other bases nearby used for training.

Ryan

Also not far from me i have the following airfields although what sort of condition most are in i dont know:
Cardington – Hangers still stand and the officers mess but nothing else now.
Cranfield – Still operational.
Gransden Lodge – Now used for gliding.
Henlow (still an RAF base)
Little Staughton – I have no idea here.
Luton – Now Luton airport i believe.
Old Warden – History is well known on the forum.
Poddington – Now Santa Pod Drag Strip.
Tempsford – I believe only the barn survives.
Thurleigh – Not sure here.
Twinwoods farm – Famous for where Glen Miller last took off from. Not sure whats left.
Panshanger – Still used.
Thats all within the same county as me.

Unless they’ve physically dragged it 10 miles or so towards Luton, Panshanger’s in Hertfordshire. It was on my doorstep for years but very little exciting appeared there then. Now a lot of the aircraft were historic but they weren’t at the time. I was a bit taken aback when a North Star appeared there in the late 60s.

Having moved the doorstep to Derbyshire, nothing around. It’s the wrong shape for aviating.

2 minutes up the road is the London Gliding Club. It has a few vintage gliders and a trailer made from part of the fuselarge of the Tyne powered Lincoln. Go in the other direction and I have the Eaton Bray airstrip, With a vintage glider repair workshop near by. Cheddington is about 15 minutes away. Luton Airport isnt far. Old Warden about 40 minutes. Woburn Park is just under 20 minutes and if you know where to look you can still find small bits of Stirling bombers that where cut up there.

Dave

Two tubs of winter flowering Pansy’s. Well you did ask. 🙂

John

Twinwoods farm – Famous for where Glen Miller last took off from. Not sure whats left.

The Twinwoods control tower was recently restored and various other buildings house museum exhibits. Some photos from an event back in October here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=62698&id=672292802&l=40e1e6051e