[Ritchierich]

I guess most of us who trained at and fly from Fairoaks know which aircraft this is. Glad nobody was hurt.

The lesson I would take from this is; when you head off for a quick bimble towards the south coast or in your local area, do you have a plan in mind if your home airfield suddenly closes?

Do you know your alternates (have you even landed at them?)
Do you have plenty of fuel or did you go with minimums for your "quick bimble"
Did you head off knowing the weather was closing in but were comfortable because you only needed 30mins and were staying close to base?
etc, etc.

I guess it applies mostly to less experienced pilots like myself (PPL, 170 hours) but I think everyone gets complacent from time to time and this incident is a useful reminder to stay ahead of things

[FlarePath]

Wasn't there but if the aircraft came to rest in the obstacle free zone, there is no alternative at a licensed airfield than to close the runway until AAIB give permission to move the obstruction.

Well that didn't happen when the Malibu? crashed a while ago and ended up in the trees rearwards way into another field and Fairoaks refused any info and stayed tight lipped and overreacted IMO as they always do at even the most minor upset.

[Ritchierich]

TBM ?

[FlarePath]

Yep thats it, the other type of Malibu

[chevvron]

Wasn't there but if the aircraft came to rest in the obstacle free zone, there is no alternative at a licensed airfield than to close the runway until AAIB give permission to move the obstruction.

Well that didn't happen when the Malibu? crashed a while ago and ended up in the trees rearwards way into another field and Fairoaks refused any info and stayed tight lipped and overreacted IMO as they always do at even the most minor upset.

In that instance, the AFRS was fully committed to an off-airfield accident leaving no cover for the airfield so the aerodrome authority would once again have to place restrictions on movements.

[chevvron]

Yep thats it, the other type of Malibu

Er Meridian? Oh very well:-

[FlarePath]

The smilies dont always work apparently. Whichever it was, if the maneuvering areas were serviceable, even if AFRS wasn't available it shouldn't stop movements not requiring a lienced aerodrome, the reactions there are OTT sometimes.

[Rob P]

The lesson I would take from this is; when you head off for a quick bimble towards the south coast or in your local area, do you have a plan in mind if your home airfield suddenly closes?

Absolutely. There's a gliding field within four or five minutes of base where I could quietly annex whichever of the three runways isn't littered with cables and fibreglass aircraft and happily sit out the problem. On the few days anyone is actually there the caff makes an acceptable mug of tea also.

Rob P

[chevvron]

The smilies dont always work apparently.

Just because AFRS is occupied it shouldn't affect movements not requiring a licenced aerodrome? There seems to be OTT reactions with "incidents" there IMO.

True but the final say is with the Aerodrome Authority; the FISOs cannot take that decision and would need approval from higher up.
Controllers and FISOs always use the 'worst case' scenario initially in the expectation they can downgrade the situation asap.

[SpeedBrake]

It’s likely the Emergency Response Plan states the aerodrome is to be shut following a certain level of incident.

Also, an incident like this might or might not be investigated by the AAIB, and so the Duty FISO will be required to compile and secure all the information regarding the moment it happened. This might be METARs or TAFs, recent logs of the movements of the aircraft / pilot, recent runway inspection logs, Tower voice recordings, anything that the AAIB will be interested in needs to be secured so it doesn’t get lost.

Its likely the FISO (and their assistant if there was one on duty) will be tied up with this for several hours, and unlikely there’s a spare team just sitting around somewhere to continue the operation!

The incident site also has to be secured, and again the procedure will be written on worst case scenario, so it’s probably a complete shutdown of all ground movements expect for vehicles involved in the response.

[ChrisRowland]

I wonder how many first solos have been briefed on what to do if their airfield closes during their first circuit.

[Iceman]

One would hope all of them.

Iceman

[ChrisRowland]

Were you?

[Cessna57]

The lesson I would take from this is; when you head off for a quick bimble towards the south coast or in your local area, do you have a plan in mind if your home airfield suddenly closes?

Absolutely. There's a gliding field within four or five minutes of base where I could quietly annex whichever of the three runways isn't littered with cables and fibreglass aircraft and happily sit out the problem. On the few days anyone is actually there the caff makes an acceptable mug of tea also.

Rob P

<drift>

I considered Fowlmere my diversion field (5 mins away) until I realised I’d never landed there,.. so, you know what I did? I went and landed there one day.

I also considered Bourn a diversion, as I did half my training there, and could find it easily, it’d have to be an engine failure for me to consider landing there now.
Sad but true.

</drift>

[Iceman]

It would have been late 1995 and the answer is no. With the clubs that I fly with now, I'm pretty sure that they have a pre-solo checklist that has to be completed by an instructor, an element of which concerns the diversion.

Iceman