You go left, I’ll go right....
Avoid imitations
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Wandering the FIR and cyberspace often at highly unsociable times
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My student and I were taking off in poor visibility from our short runway at an RAF airfield and were just rotating when a glider appeared directly overhead and landed right in front of us. The next few seconds were a bit hectic but we missed him. However, our right wing tip passed over his left with us both on the ground, us on our left wheel. The glider pilot tried to blame us for not giving way. ATC disagreed. It would have been helpful if he had bothered to use his radio and announced his presence and intentions instead of breaking unannounced into a military circuit pattern containing five other aircraft and landing on a runway with one landing and one lining up.
Marham, early 80s, maxeval, silent procedures. 617 Sqn GR1 lines-up rwy 24, green from caravan, rolls, nav looks back over his shoulder and sees what looks like a red, screams Abort! Pilot aborts and rolls to a halt as 27 Sqn GR1 emerges from over the 'bump' getting airborne on rwy 06. They would have rotated into each other.
Junior pilot from 27 Sqn was late for a departed 4-ship and had been given the brief that the ultimate cut-short in "wartime conditions" was to get airborne off the nearest runway. He was posted to Germany as combat ready, "oh no you're not" said R**** G******. He went to C130s as I recall.
I never did find out why ATC didn't break radio silence.
Junior pilot from 27 Sqn was late for a departed 4-ship and had been given the brief that the ultimate cut-short in "wartime conditions" was to get airborne off the nearest runway. He was posted to Germany as combat ready, "oh no you're not" said R**** G******. He went to C130s as I recall.
I never did find out why ATC didn't break radio silence.
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could
Brings to mind the F3 on and GR1 determined to land and all on video at CGY.
You often find one wing will lift first as you fly through a thermal and you turn in to that wing unless, as has been said, some bugger has got there first!
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: West Sussex
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A couple of years ago at Shoreham, flying as a civvie. The runway orientation is 02/20 so lots of scope for confusion. I heard a French pilot on frequency having difficulty locating the airfield and joining the circuit for runway 20.
I called: “G-xx final 20” and heard “F-zz final 02”. I looked toward the far end of the (short,narrow) runway to see another single-engined piston heading straight towards me. I started a rather steep turn to the right and heard the tower calling: “G-xx IMMEDIATE right turn! My reply: “I’m already doing it, mate.”
Maybe not as dramatic as some examples on here but enough for me.
I called: “G-xx final 20” and heard “F-zz final 02”. I looked toward the far end of the (short,narrow) runway to see another single-engined piston heading straight towards me. I started a rather steep turn to the right and heard the tower calling: “G-xx IMMEDIATE right turn! My reply: “I’m already doing it, mate.”
Maybe not as dramatic as some examples on here but enough for me.
Thought police antagonist
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Where I always have been...firmly in the real world
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There were actually quite a few who had "got there first ", this was a comp remember so more than the usual number flying in close proximity ........ and our hero didn't join the gaggle at the bottom...he just happily came barrelling in with several gliders above and below him.
Correction: for 'Dash 8' read 'Buffalo'; officially described as a 'heavy landing'. (NB it was still 07/25 in those days; I didn't change it due to variation change until late 2001)
The Dash 7 and Dash 8 both finished their display ('the show must go on') and diverted to Odiham.
And I had just finished writing the flying programme for the display next day so I had to start all over again as soon as I found out whether or not we would actually have a runway as the Buffalo fuel and brief fire had damaged the surface right on the threshold.
The Dash 7 and Dash 8 both finished their display ('the show must go on') and diverted to Odiham.
And I had just finished writing the flying programme for the display next day so I had to start all over again as soon as I found out whether or not we would actually have a runway as the Buffalo fuel and brief fire had damaged the surface right on the threshold.
It can be equally interesting to be soaring with xx other gliders, all turning left, when you are joined by somebody who decides to turn.....right.
At briefing half way through the comp, the Director announced, in French but then translated into fluent English, that a new verb 'dimoquer' had entered the language, meaning to enter a crowded thermal turning in the opposite direction to all the other gliders.
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Often in Jersey, but mainly in the past.
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[QUOTE=Warmtoast;10364119]Very nasty and caught on camera here ... [QUOTE]
Very unfortunate ... but a classic Hoskins.
Very unfortunate ... but a classic Hoskins.
Well....the British are known to rather eccentric at times....and they do drive on the wrong side of the road to boot.
I once observed an Air Force OV-10 FAC do just that....joined the queue over a bad place with all sorts of Army Helicopters stacked up and turning left....to be met with the OV-10 turning right.
Result....a Mid-Air between a Huey Cobra Gunship and the Bronco.
Two dead Helicopter Pilots and a sudden need for.a SAR Rescue of the OV-10 Pilot and Observer.
I once observed an Air Force OV-10 FAC do just that....joined the queue over a bad place with all sorts of Army Helicopters stacked up and turning left....to be met with the OV-10 turning right.
Result....a Mid-Air between a Huey Cobra Gunship and the Bronco.
Two dead Helicopter Pilots and a sudden need for.a SAR Rescue of the OV-10 Pilot and Observer.
Watch carefully and you'll notice the threshold markings tending to 'move'; in the 'long' shots from final they've used video from 2002 or later when the threshold was displaced to its present position whereas when the Buffalo actually 'lands' the threshold markings are in the older position. (Can't call it 'original' because the threshold was moved several times between '74 when I arrived and 2002 when it was last re-painted)
And 'allegedly' there was the 4-ship of Hawks recovering from a week in Gibraltar, around the turn on the millennium, who found that the weather at Valley had clagged in and the PAR failed at the moment critique...the first one went round from an SRA and diverted to Liverpool, No 2 got in off the SRA, 3 and 4 tried the SRA but couldn't get in and also diverted to Liverpool now seriously short of fuel. 3 flew the full pattern to 27 and touched down on the vapours, to be confronted by 4 on short finals for 09 having found a break in the clouds. Cue very expeditious vacating of runway by 3...and Liverpool refusing to be Valley's div for many years subsequently!
I don't own this space under my name. I should have leased it while I still could