Primarily for general aviation discussion, but other aviation topics are also welcome.
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By Iceman
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1675661
If the picture is looking north, I can't fathom out why that bit of runway top left appears to not roughly parallel the line of sight of the camera. Two beers and I've lost the plot :D.

Iceman 8)
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By ChrisGazzard
#1675662
It’s looking North North West I would think. Looks like it’s taken out the starboard window of something landing or going around on 25, which of course runs West South West and Not due West. I always struggle with it.
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By Iceman
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1675666
The picture was annotated as having been taken from G-APWA, a Handley Page Herald.

Iceman 8)
By Lefty
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1675667
Chris, I don’t think your right. If you look at the angle between the two runways visible in the photo, the only place that angle exists is where 25 and the old 36 intersect. The built up area on the right has to be a Yately, so it can’t be looking NW.

I suspec5 ha the phot may have bee reversed - eg when a 35mm slide is projected the wrong way round. If this was the case, then the layout would match the Aerial photo’s I’ve just examined on Google?
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By ChrisGazzard
#1675671
Image

Its the dispersal pans that give it away. This image is 1978 and shows them present. The runways to the east are long since gone. The area outlined in Red is the current airfield boundary and the yellow (wobbly) line is what I believe to be the field of view.

Doug Arnold bought it in 1973 so the war birds wouldn’t have been there before then.
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By neilmurg
#1675685
I was talking to a guy at the field who recalled traffic being halted on the A30 to allow landing/take off on 19.
I cannot vouch for his veracity.

[edit]Can you bring the other runways back Chris, at least 32/14, that'd be a hoot. I'm sure Yateley would prefer it to a 'Garden Village'. Something for the dog walkers (like me) to enjoy.
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By ChrisGazzard
#1675690
AFAIK, never for takeoffs and landings. During the War the A30 was closed and traffic diverted down to Fleet and back.

After the war, the A30 was reopened and 01/19 was shortened (at least in markings). However, at least two hangar complexes were on the other side of the A30 so traffic lights stopped cars to allow aircraft to taxi over.

When the MoCA closed it in 1960 all of the infrastructure was removed from the whole airport leaving only the tarmac and the terminal building and was returned to all the various landowners. The bit on the other side of the A30 was owned by someone else, so when Bennett reopened, there was nothing to the south any more.

I’d love to have 01/19 or 14/32 in use today but they stopped being used in 1985 as part of a Section 52 agreement which was put together to placate the locals as part of the planning application for the car auction site. Nothings going to reverse that now :(
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By Sir Morley Steven
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1675796
My dad told me about the barriers on the A30. We used to drive down it when I was a kid going west on holiday in the sixties. Never saw them down though.
By chevvron
#1675807
Iceman wrote:Somebody posted this photo of Blackbushe in 1977 on a FB post earlier. It appears to show the 25 threshold end of the runway east of the current threshold, the bit now returned to common land.

Image

Iceman 8)

Blackbushe Air Festival 1977; photo taken from Herald G-APWA which was doing pleasure flights before and after the flying display which in itself was unique in that BA Boeing 747 did a flypast on the sunday, the first ever appearance of a 747 at a display in the UK. It also featured a DC8 which having taken off from Athens with 8 tons of grapes on board, landed at Gatwick with (so the story goes) 8 tons of grape juice.
I was 'controlling' (before the days of theFISO Licence) along with old Reg, another Farnborough controller (Julian) and a Dunsfold controller (Mary).
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By Talkdownman
#1675818
ChrisGazzard wrote:AFAIK, never for takeoffs and landings. During the War the A30 was closed and traffic diverted down to Fleet and back.

After the war, the A30 was reopened and 01/19 was shortened (at least in markings). However, at least two hangar complexes were on the other side of the A30 so traffic lights stopped cars to allow aircraft to taxi over.

Sir Morley Steven wrote:My dad told me about the barriers on the A30. We used to drive down it when I was a kid going west on holiday in the sixties. Never saw them down though.

I recall stopping for tow-ers in the fifties (barriers and, I think, lights), but I've no recollection of stopping for 01/19 departures or arrivals.