Bobward,austerfan and brokenlink
As an ex611 VGS Instructor I concur. The loss was huge - the question for me was why was Watton closed ?
STANTA still needs an airfield - now they have to use Sculthorpe (miles away) if they are doing any form of airdrops ( not realistic unless you are re-enacting Arnhem with the distances tripled ) and Mildenhall lost their nearest strip for off field strip training. More importantly to me and the ACO was the loss of a great airfield for winch launching and we had just spent a fortune building a hangar and facilities and it was Central for a lot of people travelling (an issue in East anglia)
Another mad decision, all users inconvenienced - another victory for the bean counters !!
Arc
P.S. I flew over it the other day - floor to ceiling straw bales on that lovely 6000' runway.
P.P.S. - why not a return to Swanton Morley ??