The 762’s are often used on longhaul. Mainly based to MAN and LGW.

762s are short/medium haul during the summer, only operate long haul during the winter season.

Some more faded dayglo..

MG taken last year over Warwickshire after her engine re-fit.
I believe she’s the only aircraft still sporting CoAT livery.

Lovely to see a Hamble Chipmunk still airworthy. When I was at the College, towards the end of its life (1979-81), only MB & MG were still in use. They were used to provide (mininal) spin and aerobatic training (3 hours, out of a 225 hour course)…and being a thoroughly modern pilot, those are the only hours I’ve achieved on piston engined tailwheel aircraft.

Sometime in 1980, MD & MF, which must have been in deep storage, appeared in one of the airfield hangars, but I don’t recall any work being done on them.

Moondance, A bit off topic here but did you enjoy flying the 300?

733 was a huge improvement on the 732. 732, I suspect like many jet transports of its generation, was a bit of a challenge to the tyro jet pilot. Very ‘twitchy’ is the best summation….speed unstable (especially on the approach), just breath on the rudder and the machine would roll dramatically (secondary effect of rudder with a swept wing). Plus nothing like FMCs or anything like that. Blasting off towards the Canaries across the water involved pointing towards a strong commercial radio station on Tenerife, and cross checking position from VOR beacons in Portugal and Morrocco….nothing like now when almost every jet tracks the airway centreline to within a matter of metres!

733, handled like a larger jet I always thought. With (reasonably) big fan engines, just set the correct power setting on the approach and the speed was correct. Much easier to handle….most of the ‘twitchiness’ of the 732 seeemed to have been designed out. Plus, of course, FMC, with all its benefits

However……….as a first jet to fly, 732 was just fine, as the Mark 1 brain had to used to a large extent. It was a great learning experience!

Inspired by the threat of imminent destruction, I’ve just been up to Cosford to inspect said exhibits as it may be the last chance I have. No cordons round any of them, in fact very few people showing any interest in them at all, except a group being told all about the Trident – I wonder if they were told it was going to be cut up soon (somehow I doubt it!).

PS: Nice to capture the Valiant complete and in the sun before its blocked into a tightly confined building for all eternity too!

Good decision to go when you did!…..barriers going up today (5 April) round the 707, which also has the effect of drastically limiting photography of the Valiant (and if that’s the UBAS car park, students are clearly more affluent than you may believe)

How could a so called highly trained captain make such stupid mistake, it could have ended in disaster

The day you stop making mistakes is the day you retire!…generally only small ones I hasten to add, easily picked up by the other bloke (or blokess) in the flightdeck.

Ballykelly’s main runway has a very similar orientation to Derry and is almost perfectly aligned with it, both airfields have the classic three runway wartime layout. Derry’s charts warn about a disused airfield to the east…however, to the east of Ballykelly is another diused airfield (Limavady).

Add to that, possibly, crew unfamiliarity, a ATCer (allegedly) concentrating on another aircraft calibrating the ILS (which may have been U/S at the time) and you can see how circumstances can conspire against the crew. Accidents/incidents are very rarely down to a single cause and are usually the culmination of a sequence of (often trivial) events.

Can….worms……..of…….arrange into a well known phrase or saying!

In the UK (and probably beyond), there appear to be three distinct elements to this.
1. UK anti-ageism legislation, likely to be in force by October 2006.
2. ICAO allowing pilots to continue operating multi-crew aircraft in command beyond the age of 60 up to age 65 from November 2006.
3. The huge cost (mainly to employers) of funding existing final salary pension schemes.

Add to that certain ICAO member States (US and France being the chief suspects) may ‘file a difference’ to this proposed change to prohibit over 60s being in command over their airspace, and interesting times may be ahead.

Spotted reggies and new ‘go faster’ stripes painted on the side of some new wonder jet seem important to the enthusiast community, but there is little that is going to excite the employed pilot more than talk of f???ing around with the pension scheme, and changing a much anticipated retirement date.

Check out the 22 pages and 62,000 views of this on pprune http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=206096

From what I’ve read 146s are particularly bad when it comes to this problem?

146, B757 (and I think the MD80s) are the chief culprits. The problem has been around for years and possibly the reason it is making the news now is BALPA’s campaign.
http://www.balpa.org./intranet/BALPA-Camp/The-Aircra/Cabin-Air/index.htm