General Aviation August 2012 15

Air Commodore Rick Peacock-Edwards is the new Chairman ofGASCo, the General Aviation Safety

Council. GASCo has been working for 30years to reduce accidents in GA, and isstrongly supported by AOPA. RickPeacock-Edwards joins GASCo’s ChiefExecutive Mike O’Donoghue to form astrong team to take forward the Council’swork.Air Commodore Peacock-Edwards CBE

AFC FRAeS FCIM served for over 30 yearsin the RAF flying Lightnings, Hunters, F4Phantoms and Tornado F2/3s, Gnats,Hawks and many other types of aircraftand helicopters. He has held QualifiedFlying Instructor, Instrument RatingExaminer and Pilot Navigation Instructorqualifications. He introduced the TornadoF2/3 to RAF service and commanded theF2/3 Conversion Unit at RAF Coningsbyand the front line Tornado base at RAFLeeming. He also served as RAFCommander at Dhahran in the lead-up tothe first Gulf War and as Assistant AirAttaché at the British Embassy inWashington. On promotion to AirCommodore he became Inspector of FlightSafety for the RAF and his final tour wasas Director of Eurofighter Typhoon at theMOD.Since leaving the RAF he has worked in

the aviation industry and has been activelyinvolved in the work of the Guild of AirPilots and Air Navigators (GAPAN), ofwhich he is a Past Master. He is Chairmanof GAPAN’s Trophies and AwardsCommittee, Vice Chairman of the RAF Cluband Chairman of the Aviation Focus Group,the Historic Aircraft Association, the Boardof Trustees of the International Air CadetsTraining Organisation and of the ImperialWar Museum Duxford Flying ControlCommittee.He takes over as Chairman of GASCo

from Gerald Hackemer, who served for themaximum term permitted of six years.GASCo is headquartered at Rochester

Airport and their website iswww.gasco.org.uk. �

Briefings� � � � � � � ��

New manat GASCo

Here’s a cheap deal – alwayswelcome in these times of austerity.If you join the Embassy Flying Clubat Sandown for £5, you can land atSandown for just £5. Chris Williamsand John Woodhouse (above) havesaved Sandown from developers, andit’s a fabulous place to visit and touse as a base to tour the Isle ofWight. All you have to do is emailembassyflyingclub@hotmail.co.ukand Chris or John will forward amembership application form to you.Fill it in and email it back, arrangeyour payment and you’ll get amembership card in the post. Thenyou’re eligible for the £5 landing,payable at the Specialist FlyingSchool. Money well spent in a worthycause.

Cheap landings

Mistral Aviation Ltd, authorised distributor and leading broker ofRobin aircraft for fifteen years, is expanding. Because ofincreased demand for the famous French aeroplanes, JohnKistner is joined by Steven and Jennie Bailey as fellow directors.Steve and Jennie have been operating Robin aircraft for

several years and, in association with Mistral, have recentlypartnered the manufacturer in the certification of a new dieselengine and an electronic flight display.Mistral’s office is now at Elstree Aerodrome, overlooking the

runway and just next door to Pooleys’ Flight Shop. Elstree hasan ongoing refurbishment program and is an increasinglyattractive site to visit. Tarmac runway allows year-rounddemonstration flights, the new café offers quick snacks, therestaurant offers more lavish meals and there is a new flyingschool. For demonstration flights see www.mistralaviation.co.uk

Mistral moves and shakes Jennie and Steve Bailey flankMistral’s John Kistner

16 General Aviation August 2012

Hawker Beechcraft, the Chinese-owned (what would HarryHawker say?) bizjet manufacturer,

keeps tabs on the age of the businessaircraft fleet around the world in order topredict future demand. Well, that didn’twork, did it. But their new figures saythat the average age of business aircraftin the UK 13.7 years, half a year higherthan the current European average. Of atotal fleet size of 676 aircraft, 20 percent of this country’s business aircraftare over thirty years old, and the

while the Isle of Man offers a partialrefuge?The largest bizjet fleet is in Germany,

where there are 753 aircraft with anaverage age of 14 years. Spain has 202business aircraft, and fully 36% of themare more than 30 years old.Hawker Beechcraft estimates that 296

European aircraft could be retired over thenext five years, which it says could lead toa significant increase in demand for newbusiness aircraft as companies andindividuals look to replace ageing aircraft.But how many will chuck in the towel? �

company estimates that seven per centmay have to be retired in the next fiveyears due to age.Across Europe, Sweden has the oldest

business aircraft of any fleet in Europe,with an average age of 20 years, whileone third are over 30 years old. Incomparison, the youngest fleet wears therelatively new Isle of Man registration,with an average age of just six years. Is ita coincidence that Swedish authoritiesare the most pernickety and bull-headedinterpreters of the EASA requirements,

Geriatric jetshead for the scrapheap

Xtreme discomfortBritish Aerobatic Champion Gerald Cooper won the award for the BestFixed-Wing Flying Display at 2012 RNAS Yeovilton International Air Day forhis dynamic display in the new XtremeAir XA41. Lt Cdr Phil Thornton,Lieutenant Commander (Flying) at RNAS Yeovilton commented: “Gerald’sroutine was admired for the way that it appeared to defy all the laws ofphysics and aerodynamics and the way it madethe Flying Control Committee squirmuncomfortably at the thought of theamount of positive and negative Gbeing experienced in the cockpit.”The XtremeAir XA41 is a carbon fibre

aircraft weighing 500 kg including its315hp Lycoming engine. Capable of over220mph, it has a roll rate of 450 degrees per secondand a range of 650 miles – useful for transit between airdisplays and competitions. Cooper, ranked seventh in theworld for competition aerobatics, has an added incentiveto display it to the max – he’s the agent for the type inthe UK. His competition for the Yeovilton awardincluded the Red Arrows, RAF Tucano and Hawkdisplay teams, Saudi Hawks, Sea Fury andHawker Hunter.Cooper can be contacted at One Sky Aviation at

Wickenby, and you can find out more about theXA41 at www.xtremeair.de.

Moth Club Charity FlyingFollowing the weather-relatedcancellation of the de Havilland MothClub’s annual Charity Flying Weekendwhich was scheduled for Old WardenAerodrome in June, the event has beenrescheduled for Old Warden on October13th and 14th. Aircraft expected to beproviding Charity flights at £95 perperson are the Tiger Moth, Fox Moth,Dragon, Leopard Moth, Hornet Moth,Chipmunk and Miles Messenger. Fordetails email Stuart McKay,dhmoth@dhmothclub.co.uk

Left: the turbofan powered Hawker SiddeleyHS 125 series 700 first flew in 1976

French fly-in for Sue VirrThere’s to be a fly-in to celebrate the life of Sue Virr at Limoges Bellegarde airportin central France on August 25th and 26th, and it’s hoped thatit will become an annual event. Sue was anEnglish language flyinginstructor, the first Britishinstructor authorised to teachin France, who died of cancerin October 2011. She was well-known to many UK pilots, boththose who were her students andthose who passed throughLimoges. In addition to being anexceptional instructor and flightexaminer, Sue was a championjockey and dog-breeder.Stuart Morton, of Cosmo FlightSchool, said: “All of us here atLimoges, and her circle of friendsaround the world will miss her ‘joiede vivre’ a lot, but we do not mournher, we celebrate her and all she hasdone for us and aviation. Our aim is tokeep her legacy alive, so we invite youto join us and help celebrate her lifeand achievements at this, the first ofwhat we hope will become an annualevent.”

Battersea Heliport wants yourbusiness – so much so that they’redropping their prices in the hope of

luring you in. It’s still not cheap; themooted reduction of around 20 percentwill take the landing fee for an R44 or aJetRanger down to £280. But that’s a longway from the £650 they were charging foran R22 before the recession hit.Much has changed at Battersea since

the economy went over the weir. Previouslyowned by Von Essen Hotels, which fellvictim to the downturn, it is now ‘BarclaysLondon Heliport’ and is in the hands of theReuben Brothers. The ‘Barclays’nomenclature is part of a sponsorshipdeal, and valued customers of the bankcan get priority deals at the heliport.The Reuben Brothers, David and Simon,

are venture capitalists and propertydevelopers with a diverse range of interestsincluding data centres, wind turbines, steeldistribution, Millbank Tower, half of SloaneStreet, the In and Out, the Wellington pubchain and 40 percent of Britain’sracecourses. They got into aviation with thepurchase of Oxford Airport in 2007 and twoyears later it was voted Business Airport ofthe Year; it is now Britain’s fifth-busiest GAairport with 6,000 movements a year.When they bought the heliport in

February this year it must have looked likethe Olympic Games were going to give thebusiness a boost, but the relentlesslynegative attitude of the authorities towardshelicopter use during the Olympicsdampened any hopes of an Olympicuptick. Like other sectors of generalaviation, the Barclays London Heliport wasleft to make the best of a bad job.The heliport’s pitch for Olympic business

involved laying on drug-runner-stylespeedboats to whisk customers toLimehouse Basin, from where they couldtake a boat up the Lea River to a point only

£1,000. There are smaller discounts forsmaller jets.The legacy of this Olympic provision

could be a regular boat service into theCity, although such a thing has beenmooted many times down the years andnobody has yet made it work.Battersea, now 50 years old, has

survived all the upheavals that killed offother London heliports and all attempts toset up a rival closer to the City havefoundered. Over the years there have beenmore than half a million movements there;during the good times, annual movementsclimb into five figures, during bad timeslike now they fall to between 7,000 and8,000. The local authority, Wandsworth,imposed a 12,000 limit on annualmovements – 6,000 in, 6,000 out – andbefore the recession the heliport wasbumping up against its ceiling. It wasduring this period that landing fees rose to£650 for a single. With just 6,000 landingfees a year to live off, there’s not much fatin the operation. Traffic is increasinglysteadily; Grand Prix bookings were doublethose of last year, Ascot was up by 30percent, and Cheltenham and Farnboroughwere also strong.During Von Essen’s ownership the

heliport was run by PremiAir, and some ofits competitors thought there was a conflictof interest in having a charter andmanagement company running the facility.The new operators carry no such baggage.PremiAir is no longer the major user of theheliport; Air Harrods has taken the lead. �

70 metres from the Olympic Stadium. Thetransfer took 90 minutes and was relativelyrelaxed compared to overland transport.The Reubens also provided incentives to

use Oxford Airport, which is 22 minutesfrom Battersea by Sikorsky S76. Anyonelanding at Oxford in a business jet of 15tonnes or more and flying on to theheliport could claim a 50 percent discounton the landing fee and other concessionsat Battersea. If you were coming in in yourGulfstream GIV, this was worth around

Battersea says come on down

General Aviation August 2012 17

AEROCLUB DU LIMOUSIN & COSMO FLIGHT SCHOOL PROUDLY HOST THE

1ST ANNUAL “SUE VIRR” FLY-IN

25-26 AUGUST 2012

LIMOGES BELLEGARDE AIRPORT

EVENING BBQ - ENTERTAINNMET - ORGANISED FLYOUT

PLEASE JOIN US TO CELEBRATE SUE’S LIFE & LOVE

Sue Virr, was an English flight instructor; the first British

instructor licensed to conduct training in France who sadly

lost a short battle with cancer in Oct 2011.

Sue’s commitment to her students’ success was intense and

unwavering; she trained, and aimed to teach them to be

pilots, not just to get them a license. As well as being an

outstanding flying instructor & examiner, Sue was a

champion Jockey and bred champion Hungarian Vizsla

dogs.

All of us here, and her circle of friends around the world

will miss her ‘joie de vie’ greatly but we do not mourn her,

we celebrate her and all she did for us and aviation. Our

aim to to keep her legacy alive.

NO LANDING FEES

(ADVANCE BOOKINGS ONLY)

FREE OVERNIGHT

PARKING

SATURDAY NIGHT BBQ

NO NEED FOR FRENCH RT!

SUNDAY BREAKFAST

(FOR THOSE STAYING OVERNIGHT)

BOOKING DETAILS ON

STUART@COSMOFLIGHTSCHOOL.COM /+33 6 88 80 98 20

All of us here,

will miss her ‘jo

we celebrate h

aim to to keep

and her circle of frie

oie de vie’ greatly but

her and all she did for

her legacy alive.

ends around the world

we do not mourn her

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ur

SUNDAY BRE(FOR THOSE STAYING

REAKFASTNG OVERNIGHT)

PLEASE JOIN

aim to to keep h

BOOKING DET

STUART@COSMOFLIG

N US TO CELEBRATE

her legacy alive.

ETAILS ONGHTSCHOOL.COM /+33 6 88 80

E SUE’S LIFE & LOVE

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