diginagain said:

Well, there's a four-foot high fence separating it from Middle Wallop airfield, which makes all the difference.

If you want to be picky, there's little more than a chainlink fence separating the A343 from the AACC, and three strands of rusty barbed-wire on the southern perimeter, but the MAF still isn't on a military establishment, and hasn't been since the early 1980s.

Just slap a couple of these up, that should do the trick...

http://www.signhub.com/stock/design/maximum/7719.jpg

They must work or no one would buy them. Come to think of it, that's what Hungary could do with at the moment.

Don't underestimate the importance of these events. We already have a leader of the opposition who has said that he'd like to disband the armed forces altogether. You can't take for granted the public (not just spotters!) know what the RAF does unless they're shown.

Only on one condition . . .

Demonstration Drone strike on a collection of Abusive Mullahs, guest appearance by Hellfire ?

Failing that, let people have a lie in on Sunday morning instead of the Working Weekend.

aye-up
 

many folk here keep indicating that certain bases in the South should hold the shows instead - so what about us Northerners?
One fond memory of an airshow was one of one poor tourist at Brawdy who had his car carried away because he left it on double-yellow lines and a big yellow helicopter accidently dropped it and it hurt the car and the pilot git into trouble and the Fat Controller's face was red and everything.......

He must have had ADD because I remember him doing it at Abingdon! :E

The car looked like a flat pack afterwards.

He must have been a retired German policeman - at the 1975 RAF Wildenrath air show, he and his colleague had their Bundespolizei VW beetle nabbed by a Wessex, which then dropped it from a significant height into the wooded area to the south of the runway. Unfortunately the smoke grenade in a coffee jar did rather a better job than planned when the jar smashed in the impact - it set the woods on fire!

The Germans loved it as it was an excuse to laugh at 'Polizei' - a couple of groundcrew lads in borrowed uniforms chasing the scrap VW they'd painted to resemble a police car, firing blanks and shouting oaths at the helicopter and its crew, followed by the farce of the entire fire section charging across the runway to put out the fire!

MtM, fixed or moving displays.

Moving spreads the pain.

Fixed fits in with everyone's calendar. Ensures continuity and expertise. You can spend on infrastructure - Finningley installed sceptic tanks - Waddo improved access roads etc.

Bringing in reinforcements happens, often from the training establishments. Main airfields are too lean to provide much. Reinforcement comes a huge cost in T&S as bases don't have spare accommodation. Gone are the days of busing willing recruits from Swinderby for the day.

God knows what they were like before then.

(Not that I recall much change between my first - '92, and last - '12, postings there).

.
Its interesting how times change, not too long ago the idea of holding an airshow on an operational, or certainly an active, RAF Base wasn't seen as quite so outrageous, indeed, it seemed the thing to do each summer/September.

There is clearly less of an appreciation for such an advantage in prestige for the one service which has an advantage in this area, even now after the decimation of years of cuts. With the RN managing to utilize both its two remaining operational airbases each year for this very purpose and with us seeing the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of Britain pass without a single RAF station holding an At Home day in September to mark the event. Not to mention comments on here from those serving today about how difficult it is to manage such an extraordinary proposition, once regarded as another routine exercise, perhaps the day has come when we see the Armed Forces become far less visible, clandetine, obscure and ever fewer in number? I wonder if the Army were glad to see the back of the Royal Tournament.:hmm:

FB:)

Government: We need to cut the budgets again.

MoD: We guessed.

Staish: Let's have an air show.

Beancounter: Costs too much, no funds available.

Staish: We'll use our own people, charge for attendance and it will be good for PR, recruiting and Service charities.

Beancounter: If you have people spare to do non-core business you have too many. PR is not my budget. We need to downsize, not recruit. Service charities are outside Public Funds.

Public: We never see the Armed Forces doing anything these days, might as well get rid of them.

Government: Ooh, good. More cuts then.

Oh, and I couldn't give a hoot if station personnel have to work the weekend for an air show or anything else. I did it frequently throughout my 30 years; it's part of the deal.

Cant help but agree with CM there - want all your weekends to yourself, become an accountant.

From Nick Carter's book Meteor Eject!:

Not a bad day's Hunter flying! He was displaying an F Mk 4 of No 229 OCU.

Those MUST have been the days....:ok:

Wander:

Sorry to be a naysayer but how is giving the girlfriends of the cadets in anyway showing them what they do?
Presumably bring girlfriends of the cadets they had a pretty good idea anyway.
Would have hoped they arranged similar jollies for students around the country to get them interested.
Sounds to me a bit like 'Look how cool your boyfriend is' instead of a real program.

Yes the RAF must have been a lot of fun when it was a 100000+ strong flying club...:ugh:

as opposed to the very lean highly operational force it is now.

Camel, surely the RAF is so Operational because it is so lean?

And don't knock it if you weren't there. I vividly recall getting really annoyed when some joker wanted to do a run through Spade after 20:00.

And if it was a Thursday I was doubly pissed off because that was Volleyball night.

Bloody 617, always wanted the late slots.

I was there too, and it was great.

Now it's different, but it's still great.

[QUOTE]Yes the RAF must have been a lot of fun when it was a 100000+ strong flying club...

as opposed to the very lean highly operational force it is now.[/QUOTE

Camelspyyder,

The RAF has always maintained an operational tempo somewhere. I appreciate the gripe about being much smaller now, but not that much surely that everyone everywhere is on a war footing? If indeed that is what you're suggesting. When you joined up did they give any lectures on Malaya, Borneo, Aden, Cyprus? Not to mention the high tempo of readiness of the V-Force, the Tactical Strike force in North West Germany? Add to that, the number of live intercepts consuming mostly Leuchars interceptor crews, albeit from around 1965 forward. I'll wager that the level of QRA activity involving the two Squadrons at Leuchars was significantly higher than at Lossiemouth or Coningsby today. I do sense, with respect, a degree of self over dramatised posturing here. Plus, we had the constant and far more active threat of the IRA.

FB