Tanking Typhoons

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I had the good fortune to be able to spend a day with 101 Sqn of the Royal Air Force when they were undertaking training missions in one of their primary roles of aerial refuelling. Based at RAF Brize Norton, the squadron operates the Airbus Voyager, the A330MRTT aircraft. The aircraft we were in was configured for two-point refuelling while some of the aircraft have a three-point config that allows tanking of heavy aircraft from the higher capacity centreline hose drum unit.

We took off from Brize and headed out over the North Sea. Our initial tracks were off the coast of East Anglia which made for a convenient place to pick up trade from the RAF bases there. The F-35s were deployed from Marham so there was less likelihood of one of those jets showing up, but we did expect Typhoons. It was too long after we were on station before the first customers showed up.

The jets appeared from the port side of the jet and picking them up early allowed you to see them sweeping in astern of the plane before they approached from astern. They would gather off the port wing extending the refuelling probe before being cleared into pre-contact positions on either wing. Then they would pull forward to make contact and take on fuel. Once they were done, they would gather off the starboard wing until the flight had all taken on fuel at which point they would accelerate away to continue with their flight. This departure might just be peeling away but it sometimes included a burst of power and a climb up away from our flight level with the noise even being noticeable inside our insulated cabin.

There are very limited options when it comes to photographing the jets while they are plugged in. The pods are mounted outboard on the wings – I think in the location where the outboard engines would be on an A340 – but the length of the hose means that the drogue is quite a long way aft. This means that only the last few rows of the aircraft – it has a pretty standard seating config throughout most of the fuselage – actually have the ability to see the jets. I had been advised by a friend that the viewing was limited.

I had brought two cameras on the flight. My main camera was fitted with the 100-400 lens and my use for that was on aircraft off to either side. The other body I brought along was an older one I use less frequently these days and that is the M6 with a 55-200 lens. This ended up getting a lot of use. However, neither of them was suitable for use when the jets were refuelling. The angles looking back are tight and the interior panelling around the window apertures limits how you can point backwards. In this case, the phone was by far the best option. The small lens diameter combined with the ability to get it close to the window meant it was the best bet. Even then, it was limited in what it could see.

Later in the mission we headed up towards Scotland to pick up some local trade although, ironically, we ended up with jets from Coningsby which would probably have been fine in our original tracks. Overall, the mission last over 6 hours and we had a variety of periods when we had customers and then periods of waiting. It was definitely an interesting day out and certainly worth seeing. My thanks to the team at Brize for hosting us so well.

Visiting the Deserted Village of Imber

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There is a village on Salisbury Plain called Imber that has been deserted since the first half of the twentieth century. It used to be a regular, if remote, village but it eventually became part of a military training area. If you listen to various stories, it makes it sound like the military made the residents leave during the war with a promise of them returning which was never fulfilled. Turns out the story is a bit more nuanced than that – who’d have thought – and that the military had been gradually buying up land, leasing it back to tenants but ultimately terminated the leases and there is no record of any promised to return.

Anyway, it is now used for training purposes. A few times a year it is possible to visit the village, and it is combined with a bus programme to take people from Warminster (and some local villages) to Imber. I was interested in visiting having seen about these open days and my sister also wanted to try it out, so Nancy got tagged to join us. Clearly, the village isn’t deserted when hordes descend and, when the Army is left to its devices, I imagine it isn’t deserted then!

Trekking out on to Salisbury Plain in a vintage bus was interesting in itself. The area is quite strange being out in the middle of nowhere. Is Imber that special? To be honest, I was a touch disappointed. I had imagined all of these old buildings that had been left empty when the Army took over. In truth, there is the church and a couple of other buildings from the original village and that is all that is left. The army has built a bunch of buildings to storm, but they are very modern structures. Almost everything else is gone. This wasn’t anything like our visit to Bodie in California for example.

It was a nice day to be out, and we timed it reasonably well be able to visit the church as soon as we got off the bus whereas there was a huge line to get in when we came out. We wandered around the village a bit and watched some of the buses coming and going and then headed back to Warminster. I’m happy to have done it but I won’t be making an effort to repeat the visit any time soon.

The Atlantique is a Great Throwback

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RIAT provided many high points for me this year. One of the types I haven’t seen for a long time was the Atlantique operated by the French Navy. I think I last saw one at Mildenhall at an Air Fete at the beginning of the 90s. Not only was the plane on the ground but it was also taking part in the flying display. Powered by a pair of Tyne turboprops, the engine whine on the ground is quite painful. You do need to give your ears some protection to avoid it getting too much. Once those engines are ramped up to take off power, the humid conditions meant some nice prop vortices showed up.

The display consisted of a number of passes. There is a radar installation that retracts into the fuselage for take off and landing as well as when it isn’t needed and drag reduction is more valuable. For some of the passes this radar was extended. Also, there is a large underfuselage weapons bay and the doors to this were opened to reveal a captive Exocet missile. The Exocet is a large weapon, and you really appreciate that when it is shown against a plane as large as the Atlantique. The French Navy is planning on introducing a new type based on a Falcon business jet so the chances to see an Atlantique will be diminishing soon.

Font as a Work of Art

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It is an interesting contrast when you see modern artwork in an ancient setting. I suspect some people can’t get their heads around it but when something is hundreds of years old, there will be many generations of styles that will have been embodied and why not add something new. The font in Salisbury Cathedral was a fascinating addition to the setting. The size and shape of it combined with the reflective qualities of the water within really looked interesting. It had people around it most of the time which limited what pictures I could get but trying to hone in on sections of it or focus on the reflective properties was what I tried for whilst accepting I wasn’t going to spend too long messing around.

The Gloomy Conditions Make the Cockpit Displays Visible

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Back on one of my last visits to Coupeville to watch the Growlers undertaking FCLP, the weather was not playing ball and things ended up getting quite gloomy at the end of the slots they had planned. With a modern camera, this is not really an issue as you can handle some really low light without too much compromise. However, the thing I did notice as I was going through the images was that the green colours of the cockpit displays really start to show up. In some of the earlier shots, the light in the sky was reflecting off the canopy which washed it out a touch but by the last few passes, the green was really showing up.

Vintage Buses at Old Warden

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The Shuttleworth collection includes many vintage vehicles. Amongst these are buses. Some of them are on display in the hangars but some come out and get used to shuttle visitors around the grounds. During the air shows I went to this year, I saw a few of them on display and in use. I didn’t take a ride on either occasion, but I did grab some shots of them.

Reverse Thrust Bizjets

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Boeing Field is busy with business jets and some of them are more interesting than others. However, one thing that does catch my attention is the use of reverse thrust. On bizjets, it is often used for braking when taxiing to keep the brakes cooler. Of course, it is used for landings. Usually, the reversers are stowed as the jet slows but other times they are left in until they have vacated the runway. Here is a selection of jets with their reversers in use.

The Red Pandas Caught Me Out

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Longleat has a boat cruise that takes you up a lake to look at various parts of their collection. The line to wait for the boat seemed to take a long time and not move very much but we weren’t in a hurry. As we got closer to the boarding area, we were next to signs discussing Red Pandas. The signs were interesting and talked about the pandas and their life. As we stood there for ages, I casually said to Nancy it would have been better if they actually had some pandas near the sign. Some time passed before a red panda came wandering through the shrubs next to us. Of course, they didn’t put up signs about an animal that wasn’t there.

I felt like quite a dope, but we had been there for ages with no sign of any pandas. When this one walked through, everyone around us was taken aback too so it was quite the star. Besides, we had been standing around for ages, so a cute red animal was a great change. There were actually two of them in there. They alternated between patrolling their space and climbing the trees. I was now more focused on them and hoped we wouldn’t board the boat too soon. They did disappear again after a while, so I was happy to get onboard. When we disembarked, you could see one of the pandas lounging on a branch near the dock. Cute looking things although those claws and teeth look pretty sharp!

Take a Look at That Wing Span

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Back around 1990, I saw an Antonov AN-72 at the Farnborough show. This was the time as the wall came down and eastern bloc aircraft started to appear at shows. After that, I don’t think I saw one again. That changed at RIAT this year when the Egyptian Air Force brought an AN-74 – an updated version of the original Coaler. The feature of this plane that gets lots of attention is the location of the engines. They are mounted above the wing and employ upper surface blowing. The exhaust from the engines is entrained but the upper surface of the wing which increases the lift and reduces approach and take off speed.

However, the thing I had never appreciated before seeing the plane at Fairford was the span of the wing on this plane. When it taxied in towards us, I got a view of it head on which showed just how large the span is. It is massive. The upper surface blowing only impacts close to the engines, so the rest of the wing is not affected. I wonder how much it matters. It was interesting when it took off at the end of the show that the takeoff run seemed quite long. It didn’t seem like a STOL aircraft. Anyway, forget all that and look at this amazing wingspan!

A Hoover for Those I Know That Appreciate Them

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There are some people I know (and might be related to) that have a fondness for Class 50 locomotives. I remember when they were still in regular service and were operating the services from Waterloo down to the southwest of England. While they were all retired, plenty made their way into preservation. It isn’t unusual to see them at events and there are some that still have commercial uses. I was at the Severn Valley Railway for their Rail200 event where we were exhibiting one of our trains and their Class 50 was in use. I grabbed a few shots of it as I know it will please a few peeps.