3rd December 2007

Activity on the Airfield this month

Military activity seems to be having a small burst before Xmas with ground troop exercises this week and the week starting 17 th December

Grass Taxiways

Seem to be holding up well given the recent rainfall but then we are on Cotswold Brash which is very good for drainage

Grass Runways ….repeated for the benefit of newcomers

We have just been given the green light to lay out three grass runways initially on the central island where the DRDF is sighted. The agreement/condition with Brize is that no vehicles will be allowed to be stationary within 120m of the DRDF and should that happen due to breakdown or whatever and the removal looks like taking more than 5 mins then Brize are to be informed immediately so that they can advise D & D that a triangulation may not be accurate from this location. We will be laying these out with cones over the next few weeks. Any advice from other rass runway experience would be most welcome

Image Project

Jobs completed this last month include:

Refurbish of groundfloor portacabins for maintenance area completed

Seal and Red paint floor in maintenance area completed

Skirts fitted to portacabins and outside repainted

Ongoing front entrance work now that wood has been burnt

Top portacabin office refurbished

Heater in maintenance area readied for connection to 3phase main

Arrivals & Departures

We welcome Tim and Sarah Berry with their Mooney M20C. They have arrived from Kemble where thay were keeping this wonderful aircraft outside. They report a huge price differential for a space in a Kemble hangar. Seems we are somewhere near £100 cheaper. Kevin Mace visited again today with his German Registered Bolkow Junior. Seems this will be with us in the next few weeks. We are expecting a Beech Bonanza as soon as it gets its export C of A from Switzerland . We may also see a 4 aircraft group moving up from Bristol but its early days in those discussions.

Advertising

The response to the first Flyer ad was small but hopefully profitable. A local who didn’t know the airfield was open again has indicated he will move in with us in the very near future, maybe with a Tobago . Peter March from Pilot was very enthusiastic when he did the Freelance photoshoot. He has written a half page in Pilot for this month’s edition.

The Norman Freelance

Progress at moving the parts up from Sussex has been slow whilst we design and fabricate fitting for the transport to ensure minimum damage. We brought back the first fuselage last week, most of the wings the week before and most of the hardware the week before that. 4 Fuselages, 4 wings and half a truck load of bits and we will have the lot before Xmas

Rissington Radio

We have just applied for a dedicated Ground Station frequency which should be allocated within 6 working weeks having gone via Europe !! We will need to have a number of certificated operators ( no the PPL Radio Licence will not do apparently ). Anyone wishing to volunteer would be most welcome

Xmas Closure

For the first time since we started offering hangarage in 1996 we plan to close the doors for a proper Xmas break which we all need. There will be no formal Devonair presence from Monday 24 th December until 30 th December. Anyone intending to fly during this period should contact Colin and make sure that you are shown all the door opening and safety procedures

Flying at the weekend means you must remember to contact the VGS for clearance before you taxi away from the hangar. Their mobile in the Control Caravan is 07786504892

Regards Martin, Martin, Colin and Ken