When In Doubt, Drive Don't Fly

This past weekend, I had to travel up to Northampton for a committee meeting of the Royal Aero Club 3Rs. One of the other committee members suggested that I stay with him and his son the night before and we could then either fly up the next morning or, if the weather was unsuitable, drive up. After a very sociable evening, 2 bottles of wine and a good sleep, we reviewed the weather. It seems there was a lot of patchy cloud and at low level so the decision was made to drive rather than fly.

It seems this was a really good idea. We would have flown from Blackbushe to Sywell which is less than half an hour but instead chose to drive and our trip out and return by road were uneventful. The next day I got sent this email:

Pete,

You might recall that one of my concerns about flying yesterday was the forecast for temporary patches of low cloud or fog. It looks like someone got caught out yesterday and crashed, fatally, due to the fog so I'm pleased that I made the decision I did although I think it would have been ok here. 

This thread on the flyer forum ( http://forums.flyer.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=80660 ) is regarding the crash yesterday and it's very sobering. The text below is from an experienced pilot who was also in the area at the time. Again, very though provoking!

"I was airborn out of Nayland with virtually zero wind.. I turned S W for maybe 10 mins then saw the edge of the bank of fog/cloud rolling towards Nayland.

I tried to beat it back and headed straight back to Nayland at 120knts and ran smack into it at 8.3 miles to run . The speed it came in was staggering, I have never experienced anything like it in all the years I have been flying .
At 4 miles to run smack on runway centre line I was down to180 feet and could not see a thing. I climbed back up through it into brilliant sunshine and stableised at 2500 ft. It was clearer towards the coast so I headed that way. I called wattisham and they were giving cloudbase as 100 ft or less.

At that point I saw someone else on top obviously looking for a hole next minute he headed down at a fairly steep angle at about 30 degree bank and disapeared from site into the cloud.

At that point I changed frequency to Tibenham and heard them flying, tried to raise them on the radio but failed which didn't supprise me as they usually use a hand held with limited range. I set course for them anyway.
I then retuned to wattisham ,just as the rescue helicopter popped out of the cloud in a pretty much vertical climb. One of the people with me knew its call sign and frequency so we tried to call it. At that point we heard that an aircraft had gone in and it was dispatching to the crah site. We saw it orbit and let down through the solid cloud bank.

Setting course for Tibenham at 120 knots we could see the cloudbank out running us and we again towards the coast to see if we could run in under the cloud. We were down to less than 300 feet with 9 miles to run and masts etc ahead.

Another climb back up to 2000 ft into clear sunshine. A call to Seething (10 miles towards the coast ) gave us CAV OK with the fog /cloud bank visable 6 miles to the east.

We touched down as 4 or 5 others were calling for diversions. Within a few minutes of landing we couldn't see across the width of the runway.

In all my years of flying I have never experienced a day like today . It was a lethal day.

Seething were wonderfull and even managed to make room to get me into the hangar whereupon the sun came out but too late for me to get back to Nayland. It could have so easily been me that went in. I had plenty of fuel on board and time to out fly the conditions but it took all my skills and could have been such a different outcome....What a day"

Fog bank close to the Blackbushe - Sywell track

Gregory Clipstone crash death pilot: 'Man of integrity' 

Dear reader, I think you'll understand how grateful I am that the right decision was made, when it could have been so easy to 'chance it'

It's A Small, Small World

Over the summer months I help the Royal Aero Club Records Racing and Rally Association (the 3Rs) run their series of handicapped air races as the Chief Marshal (www.airraceuk.co.uk). In the past we've held races on Menorca but also hold ones at Abbeville in France and on Alderney as regular and annual events.

In my other job as a guide on HMS Alliance, I was taking a group through the boat this afternoon. At the end I chatted to one gentleman who was Spanish and from Majorca. I replied that I only had ever been to one place in Spain which was Menorca and that wasn't a holiday but for air racing. We chatted a little more about his interest in submarines and military matters before he asked me if I had said 'air racing'. I replied that it was and he said that he had a friend who also air raced. "It's not Gabriel, is it?". Astonishingly,  this man who is a Spanish commercial pilot currently flying from Stockholm to Vietnam and SE Asia, and I both knew the same man who generally attends the 3 air races above. In fact this man, Onofre, and Gabriel have been friends since childhood and Gabriel was responsible for getting him into flying (and for helping him get a flight at 7 years old!).

A clip from the Schneider race on Alderney with Gabriel at the controls

I can't imagine what the probability of this happening must be as for one thing, our running order as guides is decided on the cut of the cards, and this guy could have appeared at any time during the day.