RAF St. MAWGAN
On December 1st Cornwall County Council is due to take over the running of the airfield including ATC from the RAF. Today at almost literally the last minute the County Council has announced they will not be ready to take over for a further three weeks and have urgently appealed to the military to come to their rescue for this interim period. In the last few minutes the BBC have posted details on their website confirming that the RAF are unable to help and hence it appears the airfield will close for three weeks.
You couldn't really make it up, could you? Never underestimate the ability of a County Council - particularly Cornwall - to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Local TV tonight referred to the Council having had four years to prepare for taking over the facilities at the airfield. A County Councillor described it as unfortunate but not a disaster
It seems it has been too big a task for the County Council with its 22000 staff led by its new £200K a year Chief Exec.
Looking ahead, many locals have memories of St. Mawgan going back decades. The extensive facilities there with several useful hangars including the large modern structure used for Nimrod maintenance and later for Sea Kings is surely crying out for a new role, there is plenty of parking, the HAS site as well as the relatively large domestic site all surely are deserving of a future role probably outside the military orbit.
I read with interest the recent comments on Macrihanish, any pruners out threre got any ideas on the way ahead for St. Mawgan?
I appreciate, that for the moment the Maritime Facility and SERE are still at the Station. But for how long?
And what about the gorgeous Shackelton gate guard?