Kenley As was
Well done again Treads,
That view of Kenley has changed very little since 1940,as there is no development on 'the common' and most of the e pens are still visible. The most noticeable difference is the runway 'narrow' was widened and the runway extended down to the boundary fence no doubt to accommodate 'Wing operations' when the airfield started offensive ops into France. The Belfast Hangar visible through the smoke survived until 1978,and over on the left the Officers Mess and the NAAFI/Airmans mess behind are still there although the O mess has suffered several arson attacks. 111's Hurricanes (Croydon) are busy intercepting the raid whilst Kenleys own squadrons 615 and 64 are away on a scramble. The E Pen with the Spitfire seen in the famous image taken from an attacking Dornier was demolished for no good reason, such is the way of the 'crats' who look after our heritage !!!. The latest planning blot is a fence that divides the original Peri Trac around its entire length, which I do not think would have happened if Kenley was still part of Surrey. As an ATC Gliding School Kenley is challenging on an intermediate Cable break therefore we were quite 'focussed' on this due to the rather slim margin for error, and accurate low level turn requirement.. That we managed to get Cadets off solo (continuous course) in around an hours dual is a great testament to the Air Cadet Gliding system that had no equal anywhere in the WORLD.