As a young lad in the 60s I spent most of my time wandering strensall common looking for munitions left behind by the army. It was amazing the stuff abandoned. No surprise I joined the RAF as an armourer. Really sad about Linton, however the same arguments were made at seven of the bases that I served at that are now long gone. Time moves on I guess.

Strensall closes in 2024.

Plenty of time for gov.uk to do yet another U turn or are they moving to Linton? Can’t see Catterick taking anymore👍😘

Nope. I grew up there, under Linton's flight paths, and it's off too.

Still, the officer's houses will be snapped up quickly on the open market.

I suppose the closure will give the farmer time to fix the wall/barrier at 'ab-initio corner'..........

I doubt it, he was supposedly exorcised some years ago. :cool:

Alas, no plans for moves even exist yet. Like so many of the 90 odd sites listed for closure in the "A Better Defence Estate" announcement and document, the units currently stationed at Strensall will move to 'a location to be determined by further work study.'

What are the plans with Linton? Is it moving to care and maintenance while they decide what to do with it (sell, Army, housing estate, whatever), or am I out of date? I can't find any references newer than 2019.

It's a long time ago, but I think I included the option for studes to use the short provided they were cleared and the X-wind was in limits; priority was always to deal with solo studes, balancing remaining fuel and experience levels. Staff could be held to PLE if necessary and there was a separate issue with crash cover, the fire crews being required for the cable engagement and subsequent rewind. The cable was a PAAG, so definitely a temporary installation.

Possibly, assuming Annington Homes puts them on the market rather than re-developing. When the Joint staff college moved out of Bracknell, the whole site was bulldozed and the developer then crammed in 3 x the number of houses (maybe more). A developer friend once told me that once you have cleared land with planning permission, access roads and utilities on site, every 3rd house you build is straight profit.

Well, whoever waxed the place and surrounding villages this morning at 1105 ish at 2000 ft with some 2 axis manoeuvring- DAMN WELL DONE! That woke everyone up from their first lockdown 3 lay-in! More please!

D.M-L - there's a Hunter out of Scampton overhead Ripon southbound just now!

I live just south of Leeming right on the extended centre line. I thought I was seeing things........I was sure it was a Hunter but you've confirmed it now. Had a very unusual paint job. Anyway, nice to see.

Didn't see it in the flesh mopardave, caught it on ADSB

Flew over me near Ripon...


Should see more of it too these next two months as it is working with Leeming on trials.
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....c49a8bcb75.jpg

According to UK Serials XE688 was an F4 and was scrapped in 1961.

An interesting bit of info here: https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/239845

Then There was the Gate Gaurdian
 

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....cbc70b9841.jpg
This would be the official photo, taken of, I seem to recall. 77 cse in 1977

41plus,

Is that 17 Course.....it can’t have been 77. I should have with them because I went through Henlow IOT with most of that bunch! However, I was sent off to hold for some months at the Buccaneer OCU, possibly because my surname is near the end of the alphabet (and what an unhappy intro to RAF Service that was...:(). I eventually did my time on 22 Cse.

Tragically, two of these chaps were killed in flying accidents on their first tour. RIP John Cathie (4th from left) who died in a Jaguar/Jaguar mid air in Germany and Steve Belcher (far right) who died in a very unlucky Nimrod crash after it suffered multiple bird strikes during the take off roll at Kinloss.

IIRC, 22 Course had a student by the name of Richard Head......remember him from the ordeal of deciphering the Met Circle at morning Met Brief.......

57mm, He was definitely not on 22 Cse.