chevvron,

You'll have to "re-start" Slingsby's first...

We all well OT here. See it as right relief from the tragedy that has befallen the ATC.

My own favourite 'land out' story:
My third (failed) attempt at my Silver distance. At Sutton Bank, on my instructor's ticket week, I had an afternoon off, Henrik Doktor (anyone remember him?) the CFI of the Yorkshire club decided I should go on a cross country to complete my Silver C as the conditions were favourable. So my own glider was rigged, and off I went, declaring Whitby. After an interesting flight over the North Yorkshire moors, including an ascent to 8000ft in a huge cloud (I had an artificial horizon fitted) I ran out of lift and landed in a nice paddock behind a big house about five miles short of goal. As I got out of the glider I saw a group of very smartly dressed people around my age, advancing across the field waving and laughing. It turned out They were celebrating a 21st birthday and thought that I was glidergram. Explaining that I wasn't, I was nevertheless invited to the party, and after letting my crew know where I was, and taking the wings off the glider and parking it against the hedge, I went in to the party. It took my crew about two hours and a half to reach me, by which time they say I was 'feeling no pain at all'. I slept all the way back to the club, and had a monumental hangover the following day.

As for name dropping: I was once at a dinner party with a lot of folk I had never met before. The chap sitting next to me looked very familiar, but I couldn't remember where I had seen him before but thought he might be another engineer that I had met or seen at a conference or similar. Turning to him, to strike up a conversation as one does at such an affair, I asked what he had been before he retired. There was a short pause, and then he said "Lord Chief Justice" - he was Lord Wolff and I had seen him on TV the week before. Very nice man. Met him again later on holiday in Venice and he remembered me.

Landing out
 

years ago, my father "landed out" at a UK missile base.
Many difficulties ensued, pointed guns etc.
Also UK schoolchildren attended - "those are the Thor (?) missiles".
One day I will see if I can find how that is recorded in his logbooks.

With the eldest boy wanting to give Air cadets a go we took a walk down to our local squadron a few nights ago.
During a chat with the OC they confirmed that gliding is essentially off the menu but powered flight is still fairly frequent.
They then mentioned that shooting was seriously curtailed after "an incident" down south led to all weapons being recalled to central armouries.
Anyone know what's going on there?

I was out gliding yesterday and was surprised to see 2 Canadian Air Cadet 2-33's and 2 tow planes at our field. Turned out their regular field was temporarily unavailable and they were just finishing off this years Glider Instructor Course in preparation for this summers regional gliding camp where 40 Air Cadets would hopefully graduate with a full glider pilot license. The youngest of the instructor candidates was an 18 year old in his third year of the Canadian Air Cadet Glider Program......

Army cadet compound had been broken into and rifles taken.

All air cadet-held rifles (including DP rifles) are being returned to secure locations until alarms and storage can be upgraded.

No Gliding or Shooting
 

It seems that a drill rifle went walkabout from a Squadron and due to case's (not ATC) of deactivated sometimes getting reactivated there was a big knee jerk, or should I say another knee jerk. All part of the great 'do nothing' syndrome so we are fireproof. As we have seen from the great Non Gliding scenario once you go down this route it is very difficult to reverse the situation. I think the 'fairly frequent flying' may also be a bit optimistic.
As someone who benefitted from the golden days of the Cadets it saddens me to see how we have reduced its aviation, and large bore shooting element, and I shudder at the thought of us being asked to fill shopping bags at a supermarket.
We have seen what happened when the Gliders paperwork was suspect (it has effectively killed off the system as we knew it) I can not imagine 'upgrading' rifle storage will be a happy experience. Of course there will be an opening for a 'virtual range', and as with the PTT that will become the norm.

When I took over as OC 1811 (Marlow) Sqdn I found that I had a huge ex TA drill hall complete with 20 yd small bore range. A WSO visit a few months previously resulted in the range being closed, even though it had been safely used for small bore shooting for nearly 100 years, because it didn't comply with then current regs.(there was a glass window near the butts)
I managed to get it approved for air rifle shooting but it will take a lot of jumping though hoops to get it re-instated for small bore (.22 cal)

Not when you're not allowed to have the rifles, it isn't.
They've taken wooden drill rifles off people, air rifles are the devil's work in comparison...

​​​​​​​With the anti-plastic campaign in full swing, that's going to happen less and less. Nobody uses bags.

​​​​​​​Huh?

Lots of gliding at the VGS at Little Rissington. 3 of our cadets (290 Sqn, W-s-M) got their Blue wings this weekend.
VGS's are more 'regional' now, having been reduced in number from, I think, 22 down to 14 schools. We get 2 or 3 air experience slots per year, for 6 or 8 cadets at a time. St Mawgan in the summer period hosts an AEF, (I really do look forward to driving a minibus 31/2 hrs each way down the longest cul-de-sac in the country, in the holiday season) Boscombe occasionally, and RNAS Yeovilton have been very kind to us recently.
Bag-packing to raise funds is not my favourite activity but it demands commitment from the cadets and educates them on the cost of providing non-core activities and acquiring and maintaining equipment.

R

14 were disbanded, there are now ostensibly 11+CGS. There isn't lots of gliding going on, however you look at it.

10 now 631 changed to an AGS after the end of the vigilant

Good to see two 'Vikings' flying from Topcliffe this weekend.

I helped out at a 'Flying Evening' for Derby Scouts at Saltby Monday. I flew seven trips in the BGC Perkoz, six Scouts and one Leader, and the Puchaz did about the same. All the kids loved it - it wasn't complicated.

Has anyone else witnessed Elementary Flying Training (EFT) cadet pilots being farmed out to AEF/UAS in order to help free up the training backlog?

Seems totally unfair that resources originally allocated to air cadets are now being grabbed by the MOD to spare their ongoing embarrassment over the Multi Billion £ fiasco of contracting out RAF Flying Training.

Suggest you might need to refocus there Bigpants. The RAF flying training system exists to train pilots. A sub role is to give air experience to air cadets.
I would struggle to understand anyone who prioritised some fun flying for youngsters (no matter how keen) over full-time, commissioned, salaried RAF Officers (not "cadet pilots") working towards becoming front line pilots.

PS.
I agree flying training is currently a fiasco.
My son is an air cadet and I assist on his sqn as a Service Instructor so I know what AEF means to them.

Only, that's not what's happening. I was at Wittering recently talking to a couple of young officers holding on CUAS and 5 AEF. They are not 'grabbing' flying from cdts, they are acting in staff roles.

And that's happened for years. Happened when I was on a different UAS 13/14 years ago.