Owner and operator, finally!
 

Finally, a lengthy process of aircraft acquisition has come to its end - I (well, to be precise, it's Ultranomad s.r.o., my company) have become the owner and operator of this wonderful Grumman Tiger:

http://pics.livejournal.com/ultranom...6x8s5/s800x600

The man on the left is Genghis the Engineer, without whose invaluable help this probably wouldn't have happened, and the airport is Liège, Belgium.

G-NODE's new home base is LKBU.

Excellent :ok:

Just make sure you have the brakes on and are looking out when you start the engine... that hardware in the background would more than exhaust your insurance cover :)

Congratulations Anton. Your photo brought back a happy memory. I flew G-NODE as a student from Weston (EIWT) to Blackbushe (EGLK) on 21st July 2002. 2.7 hrs via Wexford and STU. Fabulous Nav Ex. shortly before my PPL test.

Congratulations Anton!
Enjoy operating it!

Jake.

It was good fun being able to help get it there for you, and I've no doubt that you'll have a lot of fun - it's a nice aeroplane ideal for medium length trips around Europe.

Incidentally, for everybody else, Bubovice, where Anton is now basing G-NODE looks a nice spot for a flying trip. At 105kn CAS it took 7:10 from Enstone to Bubovice, with a single refuelling stop in Liege. Bubovice has two 800m runways, and a (roughly) £1.90 landing fee, whilst a slap-up lunch at the local restaurant came to about £4 each. Liege, en-route, allowed us to enter the Shengen region, but charged us the enormous sum of E14 for an approach, landing, processing, and the first 12 hours parking.

G

Congratulations! You have lots of fun ahead of you, Tigers are great planes.

Ah, yes, that is Genghis, the jacket threw me off for a moment!

Congratulations :ok:

It's a European thing, lots of larger airports now are considered too safe so they make you wear special flammable clothing to help Darwin out a bit.

That and I probably have even less hair than last time we met.

G

Genghis:

You really do not have any idea of what you preach when it comes to wearing hi-viz jackets on the ramp at Liege.

You were obviously there during the day when very little is happening.

If you had been on the ramp at midnight with around 50 aircraft and 200+ vehicles charging around, you would bloody soon change your mind.

I flew for TNT for 19 years so I know what I am talking about. The flying was great but the ramp at LGG had the potential to be potentially fatal.

In fact, I remember some friends of mine, who got off their Merchantman one night at Brussels on the DHL ramp and who refused to wear hi-viz jackets and were wearing their long dark airline raincoats in the rain when a vehicle mowed into them. I don't think the captain ever flew again and the other two were injured.

Perhaps Liege should bring out a NOTAM just for you stating that hi-viz jackets are not required whilst you are visiting the airfield in daylight?

I am sure that your commercial clout will overcome any other considerations.

Congratulations!

That photo takes me back. I learned on Cheetahs and Tigers more than 30 years ago and flew G-NODE more than once or twice after getting my licence. Lovely aeroplane - I wish you many happy years with her. And I'm jealous.....

Congrats! Happy flying :ok:

JW411 - perhaps the anglo-saxon sense of humour is lost on you. DAR, who knows me, made a joke about not recognising me in that jacket, and I made a joke about my known longstanding gripe about being regularly made to wear hi-viz that is invariably not flame retardant.

I am well aware why hi-viz is necessary on a busy major airport pan, and would most certainly not have been there without it. That photo was taken shortly before dawn when it was fairly quiet, but the light was poor (more obvious to us than the camera perhaps) and there were enough large aircraft manoeuvring around to justify it.

But I'm not going to stop being sarcastic about the fact that most hi-viz clothing is a fire liability, and that some very sleepy airports with a few movements per hour/day mandate them with no real good safety reason. It was extremely obvious that Liege is not one of those.

I've lost a number of friends and colleagues to aviation accidents, it's one of the reasons I am a flight safety researcher, and more recently also a flying instructor. But I live with their memories without flying off the handle when somebody makes a joke.


Nor am I going to get overly distracted from remembering that this thread is about Anton's rather nice new aeroplane, which is the point of this thread.

G

Congratulations on your new ride.

As the very happy owner of a Grumman American AA1B these last 10 years and as an instructor on all the Grumman models, I can say with authority the whole lien are great airplanes and beat the pants of of their Brand C and brand P spam cans competitors. :ok:

Great stuff! Congrats!

Spread the word and let's hope more people become owners!

Good stuff, congrats!
What are Ultranomad´s intentions with this aircraft?


###Ultra Long Hauler###

Ultra Long Hauler, transport myself around Europe, improve my flying skills and qualification, and then maybe do some small-scale aerial work if there's demand.

Okay, pretty much what I plan to do with my mighty machine……….personal stuff, so to speak.
Congrats to you, keep us posted………..

Here´s an idea, post a pic here:
http://www.pprune.org/private-flying...ur-planes.html


###Ultra Long Hauler###

To everyone who has known me on this forum as Anton_K: as G-NODE is going to bear the Ultranomad logo, I'm changing my PPRuNe username to Ultranomad as well.