Is it a Sea Fury? :confused:

It is not obvious that you are having an open day. Has Atlantic1 updated the website?

Atlantic1 doesn’t work for Classic Flight anymore, so no 😉 I believe they have a new one coming at the start of April.

Tom.

All,

The word “Grounded” is being used far too much at the moment. Can we be clear about this:

THE DC-3 IS NOT BEING GROUNDED! Nor are any other historic aircraft.

What is happening is a change in regulations for those people offereing Public Transport flights on aircraft such as the DC-3 and who do this using an AOC (Air Operators Certificate) but the aircraft will still be allowed to fly privately.

On July 15th this year, JAR-OPS will be replaced by EU-OPS. At the same time, the CAA will loose it’s power to grant exemptions to JAR and will be required to “apply” to the EU for any future exemptions from EU-OPS. In doing so, they must be able to prove that “an equivalent level of safety” is present. As a consequence of this, all exemptions from JAR-OPS will cease to be valid on July 15th. I believe any remaining ANO AOC’s will also become void after this date but I am not 100% certain of that.

How does this effect operators of historic aircraft? As an example, Air Atlantique currently hold exemptions from JAR-OPS for the DC-3 for items such as Cockpit Voice recorders, TCAS, Lockable cockpit doors, Emergency Lighting, Emergency exit dimensions and height from exit sill to the ground to name but a few. The problem is probably becoming clear. Without exemptions for these items the DC-3 will not be able to operate public transport flights in their current state. I should stress that these new regulations in no way ground the DC-3, but make it difficult to continue flying passengers until modifications have been made.

It is my understanding that the CAA are working with operators to get some of the items mentioned covered by exemptions under EU-OPS and are fighting the corner of the operators, so I don’t think bashing them is justified in this instance.

EU-OPS has been hurried in ahead of another change to EASA-OPS in a few years time and in truth aircraft such as the DC-3 probably were never on their radar, there being but a handful of people operating them on public transport flights in Europe. It is very much written for the A320/737!

The smaller historic aircraft will also be effected by the introduction of EU-OPS, but not to the same extent as the DC-3. The number of seats the aircraft has is irrelevant in this case.

Hope this makes sense. The world of JAR-OPS/EU-OPS is a mysterious and murky one best left well alone unless absolutely necessary, trust me!

Tom

Some amazing work here 😮

I had a dabble last year although I do not profess to be anywhere near as good as some on here!

Tom

What a shame and a travesty. Sheffield was a fantastic little airport and seemed to welcome the Rapide with open arms. It was rare to fly from somewhere with staff as helpful and friendly as those at Sheffield City and I wish them all luck for the future.

Tom.

The Dak is the former G-AMSV, now on the N register, and is due to depart to Ireland at somepoint. They were performing engine runs a month or so ago but were having a few problems. I imagine it can’t be too far off flying now.

Tom.

N1944A is maintained by Personal Plane Services. Classic Flight’s only involvement was letting them use the hangar. She arrived on September 13th and was due to fly to Hamburg with us, however on the positioning flight she developed a rough running engine and the end result was an engine change being required.

I believe it is due to leave for its base at Oxford in the next few days.

The wings in the Hangar are DH Devon wings, the remainder of the airframe being in storage nearby.

Hope this helps.

Tom.

[QUOTE=Noticed that it had “TGA” above flight deck windows – will it carry [PH]-TGA at some point, or will it retain the un-authentic G-APSA on the tail?[/QUOTE]

We have some vinyl stickers to be applied over G-APSA with the full KLM name and PH- registration for the filming, so it will be totally authentic.

Tom.