Please call before entering a MATZ...

[Steve6443]

Whilst doing my PPL and since, I spent a lot of time flying around Shawbury and would always contact them. I have found the controllers there most helpful and their unfailing patience and politeness with some people has never ceased to amaze me. I always felt somebody was looking out for me. (Don't worry, I still maintained my usual lookout). It was in complete contrast with a civil airfield not too far away whose controllers' reputation for their attitude towards small GA was, to put it mildly, anti-GA, and on one occasion involving myself, resulted in a phone call of the tea-no-biscuits type by the CFI. The CFI had been sitting next to me and there was nearly a CFI-shaped dent in the roof of the poor little C152.

Oh go on, tell us more.... got my tea and biscuits.... garibaldi this morning.... however there's nothing decent in the papers, not even Lady Gaga's much vaunted tits.....

[thing]

Got to say apart from one place which shall remain nameless I've always found mil controllers very good and helpful. You do however get the odd miserable bugger on the civvy side. You get to recognise their voices and when you've swapped to their frequency and heard who's on you tend to think 'Nah. listening squawk today.'

Edit: Strange thing is I spent twenty odd years on gliders before I did my PPL and never spoke to anyone whilst bimbling around the country; now I like to be speaking to someone. I did a flight recently where apart from speaking to my own tower which is pretty mandatory and speaking to the strip at the other end I stayed off the transmit button. Just to see what it felt like, obviously I wasn't crossing any CAS. Felt a bit odd TBH.