UK poor for Night Flying - HELP!!

[VFR Transit]

I have had my PPL for about 9 years now coupled with the Night Rating, however it seems that i have done very little with regards to flying at night.

I have looked and seem what the UK has to offer, and to my surprise there are very few options for night flying :=

there are some H24 locations but they are very expensive to operate from, the smaller airfields that open 1 maybe 2 night a week are very poor times.

where can I fly in the UK for long late night flight evenings? Is there any new airfields with PCL?

Advise would be good.

VFR

[Genghis the Engineer]

You are correct - it's a problem.

It's worth contacting flying schools and clubs in areas of interest - it's not unusual going into the winter that they do a weekly night flying evening, and you may be able to plan around that.

But yes - I've had an NQ for 15 years, and am still in low double figure night hours. It's very hard to do meaningful night flying in this country save between expensive regional airports.

G

[Brad2523]

I plan on having a few night lessons for the experience but won't do a full rating for this reason. The flying club I'm at is a good example of this, it has lighting, nice runway, but due to restrictions there doesn't seem to be an enormous amount you can do other than a potter around in the local area, in the winter as its dark early.

Sorry, I know this doesn't help at all!

[VFR Transit]

Brad,

Still do the course it's worth it as you never know when you need it, I left the UK for Jersey a few years ago and got held up; with a delay into Jersey the end result meant we arrived at night and the last to arrive.

GTE,

Thanks for the tip, I will ring some locals and see what they offer. I fear that to do any decent night flying, I'm gonna need to operate between Regional airports

VFR

[piperboy84]

In rural or mountainous areas I personally wouldn't fly at night in winter without an instrument ticket. I've done a lot of night flying but most of it was over populated areas and well defined coastlines.

[The Ancient Geek]

One of the main factors is that the CAA does not allow pilot controlled lighting at uncontrolled airfields.
I seem to recall that ther was some talk of relaxing this so maybe in the future........

[GipsyMagpie]

I personally wouldn't contemplate intentionally night flying in a piston single. Call me chicken but the 2 min of gliding down into the inky blackness following it going quiet would be awful. That said, Thruxton have a good night setup and might be a good option for a launch/recovery site.

[On Track]

No pilot activated lighting at uncontrolled airports?

That would never work in Australia.

[Romeo Tango]

There are some private strips with lighting. Though the flare paths are often at non-standard spacing and have unlit hazards. EG my strip has trees on the approach.

[27/09]

No pilot activated lighting at uncontrolled airports?

That would never work in Australia.

Nor, New Zealand, there's several uncontrolled airfields here used by scheduled flights that have PAL.

While I wouldn't recommend NVFR over some of our terrain it's certainly easy to do NVFR X-Country flights here.

[Flyingmac]

One of the main factors is that the CAA does not allow pilot controlled lighting at uncontrolled airfields.
I seem to recall that ther was some talk of relaxing this so maybe in the future........

We've had it for years. We're by no means unique.

[The_Pink_Panther]

VFR,

Depends what you want to achieve.
I flew from Conington some years ago who have a very organised late Thursday to support night flying.
I currently fly out of Coventry which is 24 hrs during the week.

TPP

[Steve6443]

I personally wouldn't contemplate intentionally night flying in a piston single. Call me chicken but the 2 min of gliding down into the inky blackness following it going quiet would be awful. That said, Thruxton have a good night setup and might be a good option for a launch/recovery site.

I still recall my tutor's instructions on what to do should the engine fail at night:

1) Turn external lights off and head for the darkest expanse of ground below you
2) a few hundred feet above ground, turn the landing lights on
3) if you don't like what you're looking at, turn the lights off again........

Humorous no doubt but night flying is something else, last New Year's Eve I was able to fly across the Ruhr Valley at midnight and watch the fireworks from above.... and the landing fee / parking / circuits (in order to regain currency and take people with me) cost me less than what you'd expect to pay for a single landing at Shoreham Hypergalatic airport......

[squidie]

I use LBA, and live within 10m of LBA so it's handy for night flying.

[Cusco]

Having not bothered to do the night qualification for 15 years post PPL I was obliged to do it prior to training for the IR.

It was a bit of a nightmare finding a suitable airfield but managed it just before the clocks went forward at a place that closed at 8pm.

Not used it since....

[VFR Transit]

It's a shame really that the UK is so screwed when it comes to Aviation, so many schools and flying clubs are well behind the times.

I want to use my Night Qualification and would love to fly a fair bit a night.

However it seems airports / airfields just don't want us flying.

Southend is a good example.

The Airport is H24, the tower is manned and anything under 2.5 tonne is self handle. now because the airport i H24 there must be fire services on site.

So why charge a Night Surcharge of £200+VAT for operating between 2300L - 0600L?

It just seems we are going backwards in time not forward.

VFR

[rnzoli]

Wait a minute, don't mix night flying with midnight flying.... maybe the extra penalty charge has to do with noise abatement.

You can do a lot of fantastic flights in the dark before 11 PM, I wish we had such airfield. But our airfielsd strictly align their closing times to sunset, and charge extra for keeping open beyond that, and even separately surcharge for switching on the lights for you.... :mad:

Anyway, night flying in a single engine plane is about 2.5 times more dangerous than day flying, mostly because of the inability to make emergency landings in the dark, and the higher risk of spatial disorientation. So don't get too fond of it. I love it - but at the same time, I rather fly within sunset + 1 hour, not later.

[TheOddOne]

night flying in a single engine plane is about 2.5 times more dangerous than day flying,

Really? I'd like to see the reference for that information. I've been reading the UK AAIB reports for over 30 years now and my gut feeling is that there are VERY few SEP accidents at night, as I recall mostly as a result of running out of fuel. But then again, there is relatively little SEP flying at night, so...

We're lucky to have an aerodrome with lighting 10NM away, but they do close at 2130 local, plus we have to night-stop there as we have no lights of our own.

Buying and maintaining even the simplest set of lights, then recovering the costs through a per use fee would be prohibitive for us. I think our jaundiced attitude to airfield fees has been affected by the apparent cheapness of these things in the US. There, the taxpayer pays instead of the user, many would say this is unfair. Personally I'd be outraged if I found out that all horse stables and livery was paid for out of my taxes and horse riders got it for free.

TOO

[Genghis the Engineer]

Given how very difficult it is to do any significant amount of night flying in the UK, it is hardly surprising that night SEP flying features so little in AAIB reports. I don't think that this is anything at-all to do with whether it's inherently safe or dangerous and more to do with the incredibly low number of night hours anybody manages to fly.

G

[rnzoli]

Really? I'd like to see the reference for that information.Your wish is my command!
The source is the Civil Aviation Safety Authority of the Australian Government, more precisely CAAP 5.13-2(0): NVFR Rating, page 7, section 3.1.1.

3.1.1 Night flying accidents are not as frequent as daytime accidents because less flying is done at night. However, statistics indicate that an accident at night is about two and a half times more likely to be fatal than an accident during the day.

Link: https://www.casa.gov.au/file/104916/download?token=IuVTNa9C

I read this thoroughly, before I went to my night training. I am still in love with night flying, but the dangers are not to be underestimated. I prepare to die before every flight :)

[Genghis the Engineer]

"We who are about to night fly, salute you".

G

[TheOddOne]

rnzoli,

Thank you for the clarification. I accept that a SEP engine failure at night has a higher risk of a fatal outcome than a daytime failure. However, I still think that an aircraft certificated to fly at night (i.e. Cessna, Piper singles) with a Lycoming or Continental engine, provided you don't run out of fuel and operate in appropriate weather conditions is very unlikely to result in an en-route accident. Thus, I convince myself that my biggest worry is re-positioning the aircraft the following day, not that I'm about to die. Something about self-fulfilling prophesies?

TOO

[Mickey Kaye]

Its a joke. The last two guys that needed night rating in a rush as they were about to start a CPL course ended up going to abroad.

PCL appears to be really slow to catch on in the UK.

[The Ancient Geek]

The problem lies with the CAA who will not allow pilot controlled lighting and insist that an ATC must be on duty to permit night landings at licenced airfields.
Unlicenced fields have fewer regulations and a handfull have lighting but there is no guarantee that the installation meets any standards or safety rules.

[xrayalpha]

How is that a problem?

Surely the lights can be on "out of hours"?

There are airfields that are only licensed at weekends, for example.

And then there are quite a few - such as Fife - that are now unlicensed.

Dare I suggest that lights, the maintenance of them to a given standard and even the leccy to power them are a cost which people have historically been reluctant to pay through landing fees - because you don;t pay in other countries, so why pay here?

[rnzoli]

Something about self-fulfilling prophesies?
Ahhh, no, just me being the usual chicken-sh!t coward. Night flying has similar incident rate as daytime flying (e.g., the engine doesn't know if it's day or night), only the consequences are more serious, i.e., fatality rate per incident. So as you say, the correct strategy is to stay out of incidents during night flights altogether, with absolutely thorough preparations. Must be ready even for extremes, e.g., a small misfiring at the beginning of a takeoff roll is not a huge issue during the day, you give it a few seconds to pick up RPM, but at night, the slightest deviation from expected behavior better result in aborting / diverting / precautionary landing. That goes for everything, weather, instruments, fuel consumption, navigation etc. Prevention is the key, becase the options are very very limited when something eventually happens.

However the fantastic view is absolutely worthwhile all those preparations and conservative decision-making :)

[FullWings]

I remember doing the minimum amount of SEP night hours for my CPL. The instructions were to fly the circuits at 2,000’ AGL and set up for glide approaches well into the runway (it was a long one).

That might sound a bit like overkill but there were literally hundreds of people doing the same training, so over the course of a year the risk exposure was substantial.

I’ve never flown a single at night again but I have done it in gliders!

[rnzoli]

You kidding me. Gliders. At night. Photo please or it didn't happen!

[FullWings]

Sorry, no photo as it was very very dark (African night). The only instrument I could see was the GPS as it was backlit, although I could reflect a bit of light onto the panel if I held my hand in front of it. It went well until I was about 20km out from the airfield and the first lightning bolt from an unexpected cunim hit not far away. Landed in quite gusty conditions.

I won’t claim any originality as night gliding (by moonlight) has been going on for a long time. They were quite keen on it in South America for a while, for some reason. Also, my night return was a bit spontaneous: I made the decision to carry on as the light faded because I was well over glide to my destination and it had runway lights. No moon, though, and it gets dark quickly in the Tropics...

[rnzoli]

Oh, Africa, that explains :) Stronger thermals, dryer air (less clouds, higher base) and a quicker transition from day to night lend themselves for "stretching the glide" into the nighttime. At least you don't worry about an engine failure. Wasn't the absence of landing light a little inconvenient during the landing?

[FullWings]

Wasn't the absence of landing light a little inconvenient during the landing?
Could have been so I got some guys to put cars with headlights illuminating where I was going to flare.