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Post by PB on Feb 9, 2015 21:00:31 GMT
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Post by PB on Feb 9, 2015 22:10:43 GMT
 A classic and typical Blackbushe Airport sight in the fifties. A Dan-Air York rests close to the A30 trunk road.
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flyingdodo
Junior Member
I used to fly.........
Posts: 22 
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Post by flyingdodo on Feb 10, 2015 8:14:34 GMT
What was the Government's rationale for shutting Blackbushe in 1960? I'm assuming there were vested interests in wanting to expand Gatwick?
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Post by PB on Feb 10, 2015 9:45:44 GMT
Ahh, you could get me going for hours. The story has a number of versions. Vested interest could come into my story, but after so many years is it worth me getting arrested for telling the truth? Not sure...
Gatwick, the foggy race course was indeed selected as the location for a new London airport. Blackbushe was in need of some huge investment to bring her up to the requirements of the 'modern' airports - since the war she had grown as her tenants had grown - nobody knew how aviation would thrive after the war. It was people like Bamberg, Bennett, Laker etc who brought independent commercial air travel to this country and defeated the state sponsored BEA and BOAC's wish to rule our skies and crush the indendents. So many of the new independent airlines were conceived and nurtured at Blackbushe.
As a wartime project, RAF Hartford Bridge, as Blackbushe was originally known, was built on land that was part subject to either Rights of Common or was Common Land. The land was requisitioned for the war effort, and despite local opposition and complaints about subsequent aircraft noise during wartime sorties, (can you believe it??), the need to return the land to its original purpose was allowed to overrule and provided a plausible reason to close Blackbushe to the detriment of numerous airlines, many livelihoods, and an asset to our country's travel infrastructure. The anachronistic Common issues have for years marred any real development at Blackbushe, the preservation, for example, of ancient rights to drive livestock along the 'Welsh Drive'..it's ancient route vanishes just up the road from Blackbushe, crosses motorways etc etc, but the issues won't go away...
It made interesting reading that horse racing pulled out of Gatwick due to many meetings being cancelled due to fog. It made interesting reading that the US Government had plans to take over Blackbushe and put in two runways, one 10,000', the other 7,000'. You just need to look at the long ultra flat two miles of the A30 running through today's Blackbushe to get the picture!!! Blackbushe would have become a strategic bomber base for the USAF, while some thinking in UK government thinking lead to this new Blackbushe one day becoming London's prime airport followed by the closure of Heathrow!!
Pigs might fly, but I don't think Blackbushe has said her last yet.....
Sorry, I cannot give any deeper evidence as to why Gatwick was chosen, but having mentioned pigs I could also bring rats into the equation. But I cannot.
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flyingdodo
Junior Member
I used to fly.........
Posts: 22
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Post by flyingdodo on Feb 10, 2015 11:04:41 GMT
Oh yes, the rights of way protesters.....the number of arguments we had trying to stop people walking across the taxiway towards the 08 threshold, or across the grass before the threshold, when we were doing the pleasure flights from the market end on Sundays. On the plus side, when there was an easterly wind, one of our pilots used to delight in making a very low approach to 08!
Pigs & rats - just about sums up Governments past & present!
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Post by PB on Feb 10, 2015 11:59:44 GMT
Just a little more regarding the wind blowing up 08...The heading did facilitate the practice engine failure exercise slightly prior to when it might normally have been tried. One's aerial exploits were not complete until you'd removed the odd toupee from atop a runway encroacher.. well, perhaps slightly exaggerated as I don't think we actually topped anybody, but from a licensed aerodrome aeroplanes can be expected at various heights! An interesting example of counter insurgency ops at Blackbushe was observed while I was riding in the back of Doug Arnold's PA-28. Departure from 08, Doug locked on to his target on the runway, slammed back the throttle heaved the wheel whack into the instrument panel and down we went. Didn't see too much, but I bet the runway was cleared smartly. One of those Sunday afternoons when one could nip down to Gatwick without more than a call on the RT. Doug had suggested taking afternoon tea at Gatwick. Tea for three it was, as Gordon Wilmer - our ace photographer - was strapped next to Captain Doug, and we eventually climbed away to the south-east - grins all round.
PB
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Post by flyboy on Feb 10, 2015 18:53:03 GMT
I remember going out one Sunday to remove two women and a pram from the runway. On intercepting the offenders I enquired why they were there. I was answered that they had been told by a neighbour to walk down the A30 from Blackwater to the entrance. I asked how many roads did they know where an aircraft landed and there were no cars. Their answer. ....' Oh! we didn't notice'. And that was it!! Stuart
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Post by exeglkflyer on Feb 11, 2015 9:25:55 GMT
I remember an incident when I was at the airfield one evening, probably sometime in the late 80's? (sorry I cannot be more specific on the date) when some idiots on a motorbike at the 08 end got too close for comfort to Lear 35 G-SEBE (a regular at that time) which was departing after hours. The RT exchanges immediately afterwards contained some non-standard phraseology!
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Post by a30yoyo on Feb 12, 2015 11:14:32 GMT
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Post by a30yoyo on Feb 12, 2015 14:53:12 GMT
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