The Bristow machines and the British Airways machines used to be lined up either side of the taxiway in front of their respective hangers. I remember my briefing from Dave Cramp when I first started operating there.
"If it's tight taxi closer to their line so that if you have a blade strike you take out one of theirs too."
One abiding memory.
My very first civilian pilot-in-command flight. Allocated a flight, briefed the co-pilot, was presented with and signed the tech log, went out to my S330J, climbed into the cockpit and discovered that there were NO radios or nav aids in it. Just holes in the centre pedestal.
Coming back late one evening from the basin. Usual stuff, pitch black, lousy viz, VFR at 300 feet. Had to hold because of a Trotter trying to land with the crosswind. We were circling on the coast just where Bristow rented a house. (Boddom?) and the radalt kept lighting up on the 200ft bug. Eventually the Trotter gave up and diverted somewhere. He was cleared to call Scottish and off he went. That was it. There was no answer when I called the tower or approach, nor could Bristow Ops get one. I had been forgotten about so I stumbled off towards the airfield and fortunately the cloudbase and viz perked up.
We used the north/south runway and as we were half way down finals we could see these lights going on progressively up the stairwell of Air Traffic. A breathless voice came up with our callsign, we called finals and were cleared to land.
Should have complained about it really but in those days who cared.
Last edited by Fareastdriver; 10th Nov 2009 at 16:08.