Well nobody can complain about the lack of sunshine since the last news letter, its been hot, some times to hot. All this hot weather did lead to some impressive storms over the past few days. One particular storm happened only an hour or so after I had activated the garden sprinkler to keep Mrs V’s flowers in bloom, Mrs V is very articulate when it comes to here blooms, ask Jim Sheldon
Flying Field News
There have been a couple of incidents recently at the flying field, these incidents related to out of field crashes. The only damage done was to the aircraft and properly the pilots pride.
If this done happen remember to inform a committee member intermediately. Do not use social media as a means of reporting the incident, this includes our club messenger group. This only leads to the incidents getting distorted. Many of the social media platforms can be seen by the general public.
One of the incidents ended up being reported in a local newspaper and a lot of the information within the article was incorrect.
Accidents do happen but we must ensure the proper procedures are followed.
On a lighter note recently the flying field has been subject to some excellent full size flying displays for some reason
Jake and I arrived one Sunday morning to be greeted by a Pitts special doing a full display and it looked liked it was using our filed as the centre point of his display.
One day two Hercules took off from Blackpool airport and did an extremely low fly past, they must of spotted our field and turned away but crikey they were low.
Harold Dowbekin
Sadly last month I reported that we had lost another one of stalwart modellers Harold Dowbekin. Harold was a member of our club and did visit the field a few times a year although recently his health had reduced the frequency of the visits.
I appreciate that many of the club members will have never met Harold but I still feel it is appropriate to document some of Harolds achievements.
Harold served his time as a toolmaker at Mullards/Philips at Blackburn. Ill health caused early retirement for Harold but he continued engineering in his own garage.
Harold had the end missing off one of his figures, I always assumed he lost this in an accident at work with one of the machines, it turns out that the end of the finger was lost during one of his experiments with homemade gunpowder and bombs when he was a young lad !!!
If any of you have been fortunate to see Dave Johnsons big Vulcan flying you know the size of it. Harold machined and manufactured the undercarriage for it.
In his younger years Harold used to compete in motorcycle drag races and designed and manufactured his own super charger
Harolds modelling skills were articulate to say the least, the best example in my mind were the two turbine powered panthers that built and flew with big Dave.
These jets flew at all the major shows for years
Electric Fly In & Jet Day
So the two events took place at our field. Sadly nobody from other clubs attended even though they were well advertised.
Perhaps the cost of living crisis puts people of travelling or maybe flyers these days don’t visit other clubs. I myself don’t venture to other clubs/shows like I used to. Years ago shows were a chance to pick modelling gear from companies that had big trade tents. Internet shopping has certainly had an impact on this.
I took a couple of photos of the Electric fly in and Dave Hindley managed some great shots from the Jet day
Unfortunately on the jet day two jets were destroyed and Jason severely damaged the nose retract on his jet due to a lack of wind to slow the jet down and had a fast heavy landed.
Yes you read correctly lack of wind at our field !!! I know you will find that hard to believe but it was true
On the electric day Mrs V did us pride with two lovely cakes. One member just turned with his model in his van never flew but had two pieces of cake. I will leave you to work out who it was.
Trainers
Below is the list of current trainers for the club. Get to know these people if you are learning to fly. Ask them for their phone numbers so that you can ring them to check availability. This save’s wasted journeys which can lead to frustration for trainees.
Jason Reid, Jake Reid, Anthony Ollerton, dave Hindley, Mark Conlin, John Higgins, Brian Holdsworth, Chris Vernon, Andy Harrison
The vast majority of these trainers are in employment so their availability is governed by their work. Please bear this in mind when arranging a flying session
Don’t forget the main training session during the summer is Wednesday nights, weather dependant of course
Chris V