Table of contents for March 2024 in Pilot

Skyborne recruiting multi engine instructors Well-known approved training organisation Skyborne is recruiting multi engine (ME) flight instructors to support operations at its Gloucestershire Airport base. The hiring drive follows a series of airline partnerships for the academy, including its selection as the official UK partner for British Airways’ first Speedbird Pilot Academy. ME flight instructors at Skyborne will enjoy enhanced compensation and benefits, including an industry-leading salary of £55,000 based on a 600-hour per annum flight target, and a £200 bonus for every flight hour over 600 achieved (up to a maximum of £10,000 annually). Other benefits include a £1,000 sign-on bonus, £100,000 loss-of-licence cover and a health care package provided by Vitality. Relocation packages are also available. Skyborne operates from strategic locations at Gloucestershire Airport and Vero Beach, Florida…

New & restored registrations Cancellations…

“So, what are you up to next weekend D J?” I asked as we pushed the vintage glider back into the shed, “Tiger Moth, Chipmunk, Harvard…? JP? L-29? Or are you just gonna hang out at Saltby and fly the Lunak?” “Actually,” he grinned “I haven’t flown my RF-4 for a while…” The science fiction author Robert A Heinlein famously wrote that ‘specialization is for insects’ and I’ve always felt that way about aviation and aviators. I’ve never been much impressed by pilots who specialise. Sure, they might be brilliant in a B747, or fabulous in an RF-4, but are they equally good in both, as our own Bob Grimstead is? When I lived in California, a guy I knew used to instruct on TriStars during the week, and Pitts…

We were operating a 707 to New York’s JF Kennedy International airport one summer afternoon back in the seventies. “Numerous lightning strikes in all quadrants,” the New York Tower controller had warned. Close to decision height, the 707 was still in cloud, rain was hammering the windscreens and the wipers were rapidly and noisily smacking back and forth like demented metronomes, while the localiser and glideslope needles were fighting to escape off the dial. Rain pounded our airframe, we were being tossed about like a cork in a maelstrom, and still the captain was totally concentrated on flying the ILS… Over the cacophony of rain and wipers I shouted, “John, I think we’ll have to go around”. He pushed forward the thrust levers and eased our 707’s nose up into…

NOTABLE NOTES Rudderless Directive The FAA threatens to mandate new rudders for old Pipers after two incidents – owners demand to know why p8 NOTABLE NOTES Build over Popham! Housing displacing GA – that’s what the long-term plan appears to envisage. Does local authority lunacy know no bounds? p9 NOTABLE NOTES Automatic autorotation... ... and, potentially, life-saving automation of flying the aircraft following fixed-wing engine failure. All from a California-based startup p13 Robin not dead, just sleeping Robin’s UK agent Mistral Aviation has announced that production has restarted of Robin and CAP aircraft. The aircraft are being constructed by CEAPR (Centre-Est Aéronautique Pierre Robin), which holds the type certificates for Robin and CAP aircraft. CEAPR is a separate entity from Robin Aircraft, which as noted in last month’s Pilot entered…

Samson seeks funding for its flying car Samson Sky, makers of the Switchblade flying sports car, has announced it has begun fundraising to allow the company to begin production of its high-performance vehicle, using the crowdfunding platform Wefunder as the first step. The campaign marks a significant step forward for Samson Sky, after the Switchblade logged its maiden flight on 5 November, 2023. According to the company, the Switchblade “is a three-wheel, street-legal vehicle that you keep parked in your garage. You drive it from your garage to a nearby airport, and once there, the wings swing out and the tail extends in under three minutes. You can then fly your registered aircraft to the airport nearest your destination at up to 140kt. Then you simply land, transform your flying…

Rarely in the history of powered flight has such a simple little aircraft been so extensively modified and tagged with so many different letters, numbers, and names. In its simplest form you could say that the Gardan Minicab – which is how most of us identify it, although in reality it isn’t; it’s a CAB Minicab – is a two-seat wooden monoplane designed by Yves Gardan and built in France by Construction Aéronautiques du Béarn (CAB). The first Minicab (F-WFDT) made its maiden flight at Pau-Idron on 1 February 1949. It was a scaled down version of the SIPA S.90 that Monsieur Gardan had designed for French manufacturer SIPA in 1947, hence the name Minicab. (That said, it’s better than ‘Minigardan’, which sounds like a French entry to the Chelsea…

Spy Season at Duxford The opening of a new seasonal exhibition at IWM Duxford each 27 December is becoming a festive tradition. The museum’s third annual gathering of themed aircraft in Airspace’s front hall focuses on spying from the air. With a selection of relevant types on display alongside video screens, air-to-ground photographs taken by the RAF’s Photographic Reconnaissance Units during WWII and a programme of tours (see iwm.org.uk/events/spies-in-the-skies-exhibition-tour), ‘Spies in the Skies’ is ‘shining a spotlight on the squadrons tasked with flying behind enemy lines to gather intelligence from the air’ until 24 February 2024. The oldest exhibit is the 1936 Lockheed 12A Electra Junior G-AFTL that Sidney Cotton took out on clandestine photo flights over Germany in the months leading up to WWII. With Cotton’s involvement, RAF Spitfire…

Popham in peril? A shadow has been cast over the long-term future of Popham Airfield after the site was included in the ‘long-term local plan’. Details are still vague, and the project is clearly a long way off, however if the council’s plans did come to fruition, it seems that a ‘garden village’ of up to 3,000 houses could be built upon the site. There are of course multiple ‘actors’ in play at this point, with many local pilots pointing out the lack of local services and infrastructure, the close proximity of the A303 and myriad other reasons why this is a very poor idea. Obviously, the fact that Popham is even in the ‘long-term local plan’ is concerning, but whatever happens will take time. Pilot will be keeping a…

At some point in the future, we will no longer be spending our ‘fuel’ money on avgas but on electric charging. But who will be responsible for the network of charging stations, and who will be making money from it? Aerovolt is a London-based startup that aims to be that company. To find out more, contributing editor Eugenio Facci interviewed one of the firm’s founders, Philip Kingsley-Dobson Q: Let’s start with the most striking thing about your firm. If an airfield is interested, they can get an electric aircraft charger from you for nothing, with installation included. How much are these chargers worth? A: At the moment we spend between £30,000 to £50,000 on an installation, including the civil works, and the variability is due to the fact that every…

The day starts early, in the cool of the Iraqi night, but when the sun rises it will get fiercely hot, with typical summer daytime temperatures reaching 50ºC in the shade. We crew-in ninety minutes before our departure time, with the first stop being at the armoury to collect weapons in case we end up somewhere unfriendly. We then split up, the Air Loadmaster (ALM) and Ground Engineer (GE) go to the aircraft for their preflight checks, while we pilots do our planning in RAF Operations on the top floor of the cargo terminal. This includes a detailed briefing on the current intelligence picture. We pass our requested departure routeing to ATC, and I complete the Authorisation Sheet for our flight specifying the details of each leg. Flight plans are…

To see the monthly calendar online, visit www.pilotweb.aero UNITED KINGDOM FEBRUARY 2024 10-11 North Coates, Lincs, Icicle Fly-in, northcoatesflyingclub.com 17-18 Sandtoft, Lincs, 80th Anniversary Fly-in, yac.uk 24-25 Old Warden, Beds, Engineering Open Workshop, Shuttleworth.org/events/ 24-25 Runway Visitor Park, Manchester Airport, Gtr Manchester, Aviation Memorabilia Fair, tasmanchester.com/aviationfair MARCH 2024 24 Kempton Park Racecourse, Middlesex, Heathrow Aircraft Enthusiasts Fair, aircraftenthusiastfair.co.uk 24 The Helicopter Museum, Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, ‘Behind the Scenes’ Spotters Day, helicoptermuseum.co.uk/events.html 30 Cotswold Airport, Glos, ‘Still Going Strong’ Buccaneer 30th Anniversary event, the-buccaneer-aviation-group.com APRIL 2024 5-6 Weston Airport, Dublin, Ireland, Private Flyer Fest Ireland, privateflyershow.com/ireland/ 7 North Coates, Lincs, Whirlybird Sunday (helicopter & autogyro fly-in), northcoatesflyingclub.com/flying-events/ 12-13 Compton Abbas, Dorset, Spring Vintage Fly-in, comptonairfield.com/events 13 RAF Manston History Museum, Manston, Kent, Open Cockpits Weekend, rafmanston.co.uk/events/ 20 Bodmin, Cornwall, Cornish Pasty Fly-in,…