"The Mast"

[Mike Tee]

As a long time Teesside Airport enthusiast I can recall that aircraft approaching from the east and southeast where frequenty given vectors to avoid "The Mast", or to report "clear of The Mast", "Visual with The Mast" etc. The Mast being the Bilsdale Transmitting Station Mast on Bilsdale West Moor I was wondering why I have never heard this particular "Hazard to Navigation" mentioned in recent years. Any ideas ?.

[Midland 331]

Greetings from Eaglescliffe.

Having lived up here for thirty years, being inside the circuit, and seen a few changes to traffic over the years, I'd offer the following (amateur) observations:-

1/ Visual self-positioning to land is far less common, so traffic is far higher when passing Bilsdale Transmitter. It often goes out to eight mile final for no apparent reason apart from, I guess, SOPs and whatever the box of tricks on the flight deck remcommends. The days of tight visual turns to final seem to have gone. When this was more common, I'd guess that the approach controller would take the possibility of a visual approach into account when vectoring and descending the traffic, which would present a potential conflict with the mast.

2/ For many years, the lights on the mast were quite poor, surprising considering the amount of military traffic in the area that would have been at a height that would bring it into potential conflict. They are now quite bright.


r

[Mike Tee]

Thanks Midland 331. The "self positioning to finals" explanation would seem to be about right. The only operator (large passenger jets) who still sometimes favour a visual to short finals is KLM as the I regularly see the F70 / F100 right over our house house here in Ingleby Barwick quite low before turning onto what must be something like a 2 mile final.
On another but related tack I can remember taking off from 05 at Teesside many times on the F27 and climbing out past "The Mast" then straight over the North York Moors to Amsterdam. Now it seems the norm for aircraft to be routed halfway to London before turning towards Amsterdam.

[wowzz]

Somewhat unrelated, but when I lived in Eaglescliffe, my head office was situated in Esher.
I could catch the BMI flight to LHR at 07:00 [?], have a hot breakfast on the plane, be met by a car and driver at LHR and be in the office no later than 09:30.
And in reverse, could be back for a few pints in Yarm with plenty of time before ''last orders''.

[Mike Tee]

Aye WOWZZ, those where the days. If I remember correctly the first of the 5 daily rotations to Heathrow which as you say left around 7.00 was Midland 331 then 333, 335,337 and 339. The return runs where 332,334,336,338 and the 340 was the last one in. I can recall leaving Heathrow one night on the 340 and checking my watch. If I remember correctly we where on the ground (landing 06 at Teesside) 48 minutes later. Aircraft was one of the short body DC9,s known as the Pocket Rocket. The girls hardly had time to clear away the plates etc. Previous to that I used to travel down on the Viscount which was a different but also pleasurable experience.

[Midland 331]

It's actually refreshing to see someone doing a visual to short finals in something other than a C172. Yes, I've noticed KLM do it a few times.

The "331" was originally an 0730 departure, then 0715, then finally 0645. The rescheduling was an attempt to beat "rush hour" at LHR. However, if it got a decent run in, it would surprise the ground staff, and we'd all wait ten minutes for some steps if we were on a coaching stand.

I enjoyed many trips on the jump seat, and once did the 340 in under 40 mins. We got virtually a direct track from just outside the London TMA as there was no military traffic.

Going the other way, I used to use the 331 to commute to Manchester using two free staff tickets. If we ended up on B2, I'd hop across the corridor to the BA Shuttle Lounge, and catch the 0830. Much better than the M62...

I can't believe that Teesside is now virtually a ghost airport.