Britain's longest aircraft runway ?
Discussion
Not for the Shuttle, but I understood St Mawgan was a divert fro Concorde. In certain circumstances fuel reserves could have a little margin for error.
When I was on Ascension one time, I was told the runway there was a divert field for the Shuttle.
One thing spirngs to mind from that list of air fields. A lot of the sites are on quite small islands. Is there a reson for this or do small islands becase of their remote locations tend to have long runways so the can take bigger planes.
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Seems like a one shot or ditch attempt to land in those circumstances. No TOGA button in a shuttle!
captainzep said:
E31Shrew said:
Manston, where I spent many happy hours asleep, was / is 2750 metres. Again it was at one time put forward as an emergency runway for the space shuttle.
Current emergency plans exist for Manston because they are big enough and local to receive Jumbos that can't land at Gatwick/Heathrow IIRC. Anyone living in Ramsgate is well aware of the big Russian freight jets that loom in the skies from time to time.
Foam landings were fun though
petemurphy said:
The runway at Elvington is over 2 miles long and it was held on care and maintenance as an emergency landing area for the Space Shuttle if ever such an emergency developed
http://www.largemodelassociation.com/elvington_201...
Talk about stretching the truth.http://www.largemodelassociation.com/elvington_201...
The full runway is not maintained for the space shuttle at all and hasn't been since at least 1992 when they shut it down.
The full runway really isn't all in good enough nick to be used.
What's a VC9?
If you ever listened to the dialogue between the Shuttle and Mission Control during a launch you could hear various emergency landing sites being mentioned.
The emergency landing sites that were most important were those that the Shuttle might have to use if for, some reason, they hadn't been able to achieve orbit but were gone too far and too high to turn around and go back to the launch site (known as a Return to Launch Site Abort or RTLS Abort). If that ever happened, they had to undertake a TAL abort (TAL stood for Trans Atlantic). The landing site for a TAL abort depended on the angle of the intended orbit. Low inclination orbits were to try and make Banjul in West Africa and for higher orbital inclinations Zaragossa or Rota in Spain were the options.
If an emergency developed in orbit, the preferred option would be to allow the Shuttle to continue in earth orbit until it was in a position to carry out a landing in the US, the three designated sites being the Kennedy Space Center, Edwards Air Force Base California or White Sands, New Mexico.
White Sands was used once (1982) - not due to any emergency but because Edwards was waterlogged and they weren't far enough into the programme at the time to risk using the runway at Cape Canaveral.
If you ever listened to the dialogue between the Shuttle and Mission Control during a launch you could hear various emergency landing sites being mentioned.
The emergency landing sites that were most important were those that the Shuttle might have to use if for, some reason, they hadn't been able to achieve orbit but were gone too far and too high to turn around and go back to the launch site (known as a Return to Launch Site Abort or RTLS Abort). If that ever happened, they had to undertake a TAL abort (TAL stood for Trans Atlantic). The landing site for a TAL abort depended on the angle of the intended orbit. Low inclination orbits were to try and make Banjul in West Africa and for higher orbital inclinations Zaragossa or Rota in Spain were the options.
If an emergency developed in orbit, the preferred option would be to allow the Shuttle to continue in earth orbit until it was in a position to carry out a landing in the US, the three designated sites being the Kennedy Space Center, Edwards Air Force Base California or White Sands, New Mexico.
White Sands was used once (1982) - not due to any emergency but because Edwards was waterlogged and they weren't far enough into the programme at the time to risk using the runway at Cape Canaveral.
At one point Vickers did refer to the Vanguard the VC9 - but it was never referred to as the VC9 in airline service, as far as I was aware.
Invicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
Invicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
Eric Mc said:
At one point Vickers did refer to the Vanguard the VC9 - but it was never referred to as the VC9 in airline service, as far as I was aware.
Invicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
The rumour at the time was that the wrong adhesive had been used to fix some A/C outlets but I guess it was most likely just that, a rumour! When I was there all they used to do was ship live veal to Perpignan. Owner had a good reg plate though on his car. UPLIFInvicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
Not the shuttle, but Fairwood airport on Gower, near Swansea, used to be a divert for Concorde as it's not far off the New York route.
As I understand it the runway is long enough that Concorde could have landed but to take off again would have required quite a bit of resurfacing and a road closure.
As I understand it the runway is long enough that Concorde could have landed but to take off again would have required quite a bit of resurfacing and a road closure.
E31Shrew said:
Eric Mc said:
At one point Vickers did refer to the Vanguard the VC9 - but it was never referred to as the VC9 in airline service, as far as I was aware.
Invicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
The rumour at the time was that the wrong adhesive had been used to fix some A/C outlets but I guess it was most likely just that, a rumour! When I was there all they used to do was ship live veal to Perpignan. Owner had a good reg plate though on his car. UPLIFInvicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
E31Shrew said:
Manston, where I spent many happy hours asleep, was / is 2750 metres. Again it was at one time put forward as an emergency runway for the space shuttle.
My friend learnt to fly at Manston. Apparently, you could manage quite a few touch and gos down that runway in a Piper Warrior....Eric Mc said:
E31Shrew said:
Eric Mc said:
At one point Vickers did refer to the Vanguard the VC9 - but it was never referred to as the VC9 in airline service, as far as I was aware.
Invicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
The rumour at the time was that the wrong adhesive had been used to fix some A/C outlets but I guess it was most likely just that, a rumour! When I was there all they used to do was ship live veal to Perpignan. Owner had a good reg plate though on his car. UPLIFInvicta used a fleet of ex-Air Canada aircraft for a short while. Sadly, in 1973 they flew one into a hill in Switzerland killing a load of mums on a Christmas shopping trip. It's a largely fogotten tragedy today.
Waspy1 said:
Using the scale on this map, I make Fairford about 3500 meters.
Only if you count the Overrun Areas marked by the yellow chevrons beyond each threshold. Normally Overrun areas are not included when measuring the length of a runway as they are too weak to support aircraft except in emergencies. Fairford's published distance is 3,046m so slighltly shorter than Brize.Gassing Station | Boats, Planes & Trains | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff