Alan
Thank you for the explanation, has it really been such a long time since I did left base onto 10 coming home from Edinburgh in the evening ? ! Oh well, I can also remember arriving on Dash-7s from Paris, so I guess I'm showing my age. They were a different style again, you felt they could probably do their entire descent and approach inside the airfield boundary !
Just for interest, what height are we typically at when returning from the north onto 10 and crossing the outbound traffic ? Presumably above 3,000, but beneath the Heathrow traffic. Or is the latter non-existent when on easterlies ? Sorry, but a 1:250,000 VFR chart and a Pooleys Guide is all I currently run to !
And WHY no straight ahead departures from 10 ? Just a reciprocal of 28 arrivals.