Interesting piece here from OC BBMF about Friday’s drama. I hope non-FB people can read it (I’m not sure!)
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=713786088658055&id=605415276161804
edit, I’ve just worked out how to copy and paste it!
Hi, it’s Dunc (OC BBMF) here! Thought I’d give you an insight into Fridays arrival from my perspective. If you didn’t know, I had planned what I hoped would be a spectacular arrival for VR A, with our Lanc and 2 fighters (Milli and I in a Spit and Hurricane) meeting her at Kirton in Lindsay and then transiting across Scampton, Lincoln Cathedral, Waddington, Cranwell and then into Coningsby. The Red Arrows were to arrive over the top of the formation at both Lincoln and Coningsby trailing Red White and Blue. We briefed for this on Thursday evening as the Canadians were setting off from Iceland very early on Friday with one of our Navigators, Rich Gibby, on board to assist in the complexities of the formation join up at the end of their 6 hour sortie. We used Skype to communicate with Iceland and had all other elements at BBMF.
On the day we did MET at 0830. It was a better prospect than we had hoped for. The MET man said that the rain was due at 1400 so we might get away with it!! We tracked VR A across the ocean as she headed toward Scotland and our Nav Jim Furness looked at us bleakly and said ‘I reckon she is 35 minutes late’… This took us perilously close to the rain. Undeterred I told everyone we would brief on time and so we recapped all the points from yesterdays brief ,with up to date winds and other minor detail, at 1050. After this it was a case of watching the weather radar and hoping. We got word from Scottish Radar that VRA was indeed 35 minutes late and slipped the timings accordingly. At around 1230 local there was an ominous development. A huge line of thunderstorms emerged in the South and were tracking North, around an hour away from Coningsby. As we watched them develop it was time to make some tough decisions. With the weather deteriorating all the time and the Canadian Lanc now progressing past Edinburgh, and further storms developing to the North at Humberside and even up towards Teeside, should we advise VR A to go safely into Newcastle and await fairer weather? We booked it as a diversion just in case and then saw that Doncaster might escape the rain… at 1320, ten minutes before the original time we were supposed to arrive at Coningsby as a formation, the heavens opened and torrential ranin accompanied thunder and lightening. The weather was such that I had to make the heartbreaking decision to ground our aircraft. A join in that weather was not going to be safe. We were all bitterly disappointed. We advised that the Canadians continued south with Doncaster booked as a div if it got too dicey!! Now the priority was making sure that VR A arrived safely, hopefully at Coningsby, but if not, at least somewhere! My personal feeling was that, with the weather as it was, there was only about a 30% chance of it making it to Coningsby. We hoped that if they did make it at least the Red Arrows might make it to be able to welcome them. They, by this time, were in their aircraft and preparing to launch.
We watched the aircraft as it crossed the Humber and it seemed to turn towards Humberside. ‘It’s not coming’ we thought. Then it turned back south and we got the message that it couldn’t flypast all of the other locations, but was coming directly to Coningsby and would arrive in 9 minutes!!
With 3 minutes to go I stood in the rain, 500 other people sheltering from the rain in the Hangar or under the tents, looking out to the North to see if I could see her. To the south the sky was a little brighter, but to the north, where VR A was coming from, it was ominously black. Then there was a shout from Rog Nichols, one of our Lanc Pilots, and there she was, on finals, wheels down, at the end of an epic journey!
I can’t tell you how pleased I was to see her, along with 500 people at the Flight, and thousands outside the fence.
The rest of the afternoon was fabulous, welcoming the boys and then, most importantly, honouring more than 100 veterans who had come as our guests of honour.
But this is just the start. Now, the adventure begins…..
Dunc.
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