Poor Caroline having to put up with that rubbish, aren’t there other, unused airfields that they could waste their time and their hideous amounts of money on, or, no doubt DX was rightly earning a bit of dosh for putting up with it, despite it’s affect on their dodgey runway. No doubt those morons on Top Gear had something to do with it.
Sorry, F1 and it’s wierd entourage, as far as I’m concerned, genuine car racing finished in the 50’s, don’t inflict your modern cr@p on our much beloved airfield, you should be ashamed of yourselves IWM for allowing it to happen, especially in front of the paying public.
WEEEE WEEEE WEEEE, just the sort of thing you want to hear when you’re wandering about the hallowed hangars, even worse when a Spitty is about to take off.
Victor Meldrew

Victor Meldrew? This post reminds me more of the batty Major from Farty Owls Warty Towels Fawlty Towers.. :diablo:

SO21 3BD is close by

Looks like D-AHAL to me, which would fit:

D-AHAL, Junkers Ju52/3mge, ‘Otto Bernert’, lsd Luftwaffe 00.10.1934, Destroyed 1944

When I worked in the tower at Northolt in the 70’s a regular sight was a lone figure walking across to the pundit from the airfield fire station with a cup of tea in his hand, ‘for the bloke inside who works it’..

Does anyone still do initiation rites in these safety conscious and litigious times?

Incidentally I too have failed to find a photo of a modern pundit, though I did find this description in a 1953 copy of Flight:

“[…] mobile landmark beacon which is trailer-borne (J.B. and Co., Ltd) and is the modern version of what in wartime was known as a Pundit. Its purpose is to give a flashing two-letter identification from its red neon tubes. The power is provided by a Coventry Climax generator set, although attachments are provided should an external power supply be required in emergency. Once started, it needs no attendant for a night’s operation but continues to push out – in the case of the vehicle at Odiham “O M” as dictated by the cam plates controlling the electric contacts, driven themselves by a small electric motor. The eight neon tubes are each separate, but provision is made for using only two or four at a time should this be desirable.”

You are correct, that is exactly what has happened, we can’t get any channels interested in any of our aviation shows. Even Discovery are not interested in aviation any more.

Don’t know if it was a slow news weekend but both BBC South Today and Meridian News have been full of the soon-to-be-auctioned 2 seater Spitfire, even though the only connection with this area that I am aware of is that the rebuild (almost 100% I gather) was carried out at Thruxton.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/7987821.stm

Corroding and decaying.

That’s about right.. Pics etc here
Very sad.

Photo 9: The buildings in the background are a power house and the large building, the structure the “Orange Yeoman” Type 82 radar system (withdrawn years ago but you can Google that for more info, etc). Here’s the one at Lindholme: http://airfieldarchaeology.fotopic.net/p46033969.html

Sorry to resurrect this old thread but I’ve only just discovered it and the forum. 😎
The large building in the background was originally the control room for the Bloodhound missile complex, it later became Midland Radar and I worked there as a humble AATC from 1979 to 1982. Midrad provided a departure service for Binbrook, Scampton, Waddington, Finningly, Coningsby and Marham and an airway crossing service for Blue 1 over the North Sea. The skies were much busier then, with processions of A10s and F111s up and down the east coast heading for the ranges and the Aggressors from Alconbury dogfighting anyone and everyone. I also remember watching the screen with awe as Lightnings from Binbrook launched, you could tell by the distance between the radar ‘paints’ that they were really motoring, I saw nothing else going anywhere near as fast as them.
North Luffenham was by far my best posting, I made many friends in the surrounding pubs and villages (The Nag & Bag, Kings Arms at Wing etc) and remember it fondly. It would be fascinating to see what is left inside the control room, I can remember the internal layout of the building as if I was there last week rather than 26 years ago… 🙁