The au pair and a low-flying helicopter

[airborne_artist]

Case of the au pair and a 'low-flying helicopter'


"A Ministry of Defence helicopter broke low-flying rules and wrecked the award-winning conservatory of a Sussex mansion as the crew tried to "communicate" with a sunbathing au pair, it was claimed at London's High Court.

Barry and Anna George, the owners of The Old Stables, Mead Street, Eastbourne, have alleged that the Merlin helicopter flew to 500ft or lower and caused damage estimated at hundreds of thousands of pounds."



Full report in the Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=WX5UW2K4ONDTJQFIQMFCFF4AVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2007/10/19/ncopter119.xml)

[Affirmatron]

I wish I had a sun-bathing au pair :E, and a house that somebody could do hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of damage too.

High Court you say, hope she was worth it and the boys did eventually get to 'communicate'.......

[rodthesod]

I suspect they meant to say 50ft or less.

[South Bound]

So claim on your insurance you money-grabbing gimps, like the rest of us would have to do if our £250k conservatory got damaged...

If you don't have any insurance then you are too rich and stupid to be believed.......

[Seldomfitforpurpose]

Without reading the article one assumes this was an RAF crew as it was a sunbathing women that was being oggled..........which kind of rules out the Navy :oh:

[The Helpful Stacker]

Without reading the article one assumes this was an RAF crew as it was a sunbathing women that was being oggled..........which kind of rules out the Navy

Now now, I'm sure the WAFU have female pilots who might be interested in seeing sun-bathing females.

[Two's in]

You heartless bunch, here we have a single income family, struggling to make ends meet in their two million quid mansion in Sussex, never knowing if they will have to sell a couple of cases of Bolly to be able to pay the Au Pair, and you begrudge them trying to get quarter of a million quid out of the taxpayer - shame on you all.

In unrelated news, the award for "Least Sympathetic Family Hardship story" goes to...

[PPRuNeUser0211]

I was pinged to give a talk at a local Air Training Corps eve the other day about aircrew selection etc, turned up and gave the talk to a nice bunch of kids, then afterwards over a brew was chatting to the staff, one of who(m) was chatting about how easy it was to get money out of the noise/low flying complaints system, saying that he'd put in a claim that his wife had spilt tea all over her dress and was therefore forced to by a new one due to the shock she'd had when an a/c flew low over their house! He'd been told to get a receipt, send it in and had had the claim re-imbursed. In his words "I told the wife not to go to M&S, but spend some serious money!".

That from someone who is supposedly RAF-orientated!

[chopper2004]

Anyone remember the case in Italy in early 2002, think it was April or May where a flight of UH-60L and CH-47D from 12th Combat Aviation Bde (then known as 12th Aviation Battalion) at Wiesbaden/Illesheim/Gielbestadt were on their way somewhere from Germany, flew down to Italy and buzzed a beach.

Basically the crews saw the usual holidaymakers doing the topless sunbathing and decided for closer view at low level. The result ? Sand and umbrellas blown off and the complaints reached parliamentary level. This in turn caused the Italians of 96 when an USMC EA-6B crew from Aviano hit a cable car/gondola while flying at low level. SO there was an uproar

However in 2002 Farnborough I spoke to F Co, 12th Avn CH-47D crew and disappointed it wasn't them that flew that beach mission!!

Who says you have to be Maverick to buzz the tower!!:)

[vecvechookattack]

He said that the helicopter crew had not got permission to fly at under 1,000ft, as stipulated by MoD regulations

Have the rules changed?

[burpblade]

No........:ok:

[MightyGem]

I was accused of breaking glass in a conservatory one time by low flying. Sadly no au pair, but bad weather. I was very disappointed when the CFI didn't go around to inspect the "damage".

[Warmtoast]

From the Daily Mail



Central to the case is a piece of equipment on the Merlin which measures the height at which the helicopter is flying.
That was not working at the time.

So who knows how high they were flying?

[Compressorstall]

What utter b*%%£cks! The Merlin would have had to have hovered over the conservatory. I would be suing the company that installed it for shoddy workmanship.
I hope that Mrs CS doesn't see this as I want to buy a conservatory for CS Towers, I don't think she would agree to the au pair as the eaglets are more of the age that they are preying on others' au pairs.

[Brewster Buffalo]

Perhaps MOD should sue the au pair?

[ShyTorque]

I would like a new conservatory, too. I've had an estimate, it will be less than 10% of the cost of this one.

I'm sure it was a Vulcan bomber, one's been buzzing around not 60 miles from here. Where do I complain?

P.S. Still waiting for planning permission for the conservatory, so no great rush.

[Saintsman]

I'm surprised that this has got to court. Right or wrong, its usually cheaper to settle than spend a fortune on lawyers.

[ossie]

Have and leak in your roof? Wait till the next helicopter comes past!

If the taxpayer ends up paying for this scam they need better lawyers! I wonder if the house owners have claimed on their insurance?

An helicopter hovers over a town at 50ft and only one couple with a leaky roof complain - right!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The couple should be called to book for their untrue story.

[c130jbloke]

Perhaps, as this sounds like such th bull§hit claim, the MoD have decided to make a stand and fight this one out as a statement to all the money grabbing to§§ers out there that the LF claims gravy train is now derailed.

[Aer Maritz]

:E
Once got in trouble for buzzing the boss while he was practicing his golf swing :}
He was a bit upset but i managed to persuade my mate, a civvy ;), who was sitting next to me to take the flak:E
We were in our own aeroplane, but said boss would have none of it and i was given a serious reaming and promoted a month later :ok:
And he employed me when we both gave up playing soldiers:)
Great fun! Wish i was 20 again:sad:

[Pontius Navigator]

. . . the staff, one of who(m) was chatting about how easy it was to get money out of the noise/low flying complaints system, saying that he'd put in a claim that his wife had spilt tea all over her dress and was therefore forced to by a new one due to the shock she'd had when an a/c flew low over their house! He'd been told to get a receipt, send it in and had had the claim re-imbursed. In his words "I told the wife not to go to M&S, but spend some serious money!".

That from someone who is supposedly RAF-orientated!

Sounds like ex-Air Force and a realist. Having been :mad: around by the MOD he could see a way to :mad: his own back.:}

Now when that pair of Jaguars flew combat manoeuvres over my house for 20 minutes in 1979 . . . gave me real palpitations. Must be worth a claim now.

[Wensleydale]

If found guilty, will the crew end up in the glasshouse?:O

[The Helpful Stacker]

Have and leak in your roof? Wait till the next helicopter comes past!

Well thats what some moaning old bint down the road from Odiham did (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/28/nchin28.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/03/28/ixhome.html).

"We are not unsympathetic to the problems faced by Mrs Wallinger but the fact is she moved into a house that is directly under the designated flight path. There have been Chinooks at Odiham since 1982.

[TheStrawMan]

A young lady friend I worked with had the same happen to her years ago. She lived within 2 miles of 40 Commando Royal Marines Camp Taunton.
She regularly was looked in on when sunbathing topless outside by helicopters from the camp. I think she was flattered as she never complained and continued to bronze herself.

[Fareastdriver]

Looking back at military damage to civilian property in the old days of RAF Germany and BAOR exercises were held in the projected area of operations. You looked at the map, decided where to camp out and flew in. Then you rearranged the site to suit yourself. The local populace had no say in it whatsoever.
Tanks were the worst. They used to charge through farmland crushing crops and fences to their hearts content. It was reckoned that they could more damage, in monetary terms, in a week, than they had during the whole of WW II. At ENDEX a civilian liaison officer would drive around with a big pile of money and settled up all the claims there and then.
On one exercise a tank drove into a hamlet, stopped outside the hostelry and the crew dismounted with the idea of imbibing in some liquid refreshment. They were refused. “No fudding Englischers here.” Somewhat miffed they climbed back into their tank, drove it up to the front of the building, stuffed the barrel through a window and loosed off a 105mm blank.
It had the desired effect, it completely totaled the bar. Half-a-dozen deaf, incoherent Germans staggered out from a carpet of glass and schnapps just in time to see the tank disappear round a corner.
They never did find out who did it but it was rumoured that the commander was a Hyde Park Lancer. Fortunately one of the customers had spilled the beans as to why the incident had happened so the inquiry was fairly informal. Meanwhile our liaison officer had fronted up the money to get the place rebuilt.
A year later it was exercise season again in the same area.. This time outside the bar was a big sign.
Der Englander Soldas ar Velcome

[BEagle]

I'm glad someone has mentioned that story, as I also heard it in RAFG some years ago.

Allegedly some German had said "Ve don't serve Englanders in this bar!"

After the tank had fired its blank, our Woopert reappeared and announced:

"You don't serve f*cking anyone in this bar now, do you Fritz?"

But being a Queens Own Chinless Pwancer, he did do the decent thing and pay for the damage!

Now that was style!

I also heard that, in the mid-50s, someone drove a tank quietly into the main street of some little German village at first light one sleepy Summer morning. Then fired a main armament blank.

"GOOD MORNING, LOSERS!" came a voice from a loudspeaker somewhere nearby.

In the '70s, several German farmers would actually quite welcome Woopert and Wodney wacing awound in their little tanks - the compensation was vastly better than their normal income. But the RAF, being slightly more politically correct than the dung eaters, found that the days of 'fishing' by lobbing a triple thunderflash into a dammed-up trout stream were long gone - the water baliff wished them well and told them that they could have their fish, but for Dm100- per fish!

[Rigex]

I remember there was a book which related all of the similar exploits of BAOR and a follow-up about the Falklands. Unfortunately they were lent out and never reappeared!:*

I wouldn't mind replacing them if anyone could remind me of the titles!

[Stretch182]

Rigex

Funny old thing, my copies went the same way !!! Titles were:

Don't cry for me Sergeant Major
and
Try not to laugh Sergeant Major

[0497]

Similar but roles reversed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/world/middleeast/25blackwater.html?em&ex=1193457600&en=3b6b4e88aa21d394&ei=5087%0A

Under Siege, Blackwater Takes On Air of Bunker
By PAUL von ZIELBAUER (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/z/paul_von_zielbauer/index.html?inline=nyt-per) and JAMES GLANZ (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/g/james_glanz/index.html?inline=nyt-per)

BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 — The Blackwater USA (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/blackwater_usa/index.html?inline=nyt-org) compound here is a fortress within a fortress. Surrounded by a 25-foot-high wall of concrete topped by a chain-link fence and razor wire, the compound sits deep inside the heavily defended Green Zone, its two points of entry guarded by Colombian Army veterans carrying shotguns and automatic rifles.


....

Inside the Blackwater camp, a crisp American flag is carefully raised and lowered each day in Baghdad’s dusty heat. In the closely stacked gray metal trailers that serve as living quarters, employees have 8-by-12-foot rooms and shared bathrooms. Recreation time is limited, and the employees eat among themselves. Many of the younger guards sunbathe on their trailer roofs — a few regularly did so in the nude, until female helicopter pilots flew overhead, saw them and complained.

.....

[A2QFI]

11 copies of each available at www.abebooks.co.uk. Prices start at £9.70 for Don't Cry and about £3 Try not to to laugh.

[Rigex]

Stretch 182 & A2QFI,

Thanks both, I'll use this month's pocket money on replacements.