Blackhawk pair over The City.

[anonymous-user]

"Hell we don't need no god-amm heli-lanes"

[Mutley]

What time was this? I regularly see the Chinook over the Tower, but missed a blackhawk

[anonymous-user]

About 15:00.
They went waxing over head Aldwych station, towards the South bank, then straight back again about ten minutes later, direct line, no obvious attempt to follow the river at all.

[z4chris99]

unrelated but why does it stink of burnt plastic tonight?

[ditchvisitor]

The strictest controlled airspace in the UK and no doubt under Special VFR, I doubt they were there by accident!!! Obviously doing what they were told by Heathrow or Thames radar, you dont always have to follow the river

[Cheib]

When I was a lad a mate of mine who had trained as a pilot with the Army Air Corp needed to keep his hours up whilst looking for a job in civil aviation....we hired a light aircfraft from Stapleford in Essex and flew right in to Tower Bridge which I think was the limit of Heathrow control zone at the time....that was before City airport existed. Imagine that now people effectively joy riding over Central London!

[Dragoco]

I saw a single Blackhawk over St.James park from the window by my desk yesterday afternoon. In my mind all I could hear was "IRENE, IRENE, all callsigns IRENE!"



Chinooks and Apaches are more frequent, I just assumed they are familiarisation flights so that the pilots know the terrain for when they have to defend us from the imminent, innevitable zombie apocalypse...

[wolves_wanderer]

Crossflow Kid said:

About 15:00.
They went waxing over head Aldwych station, towards the South bank, then straight back again about ten minutes later, direct line, no obvious attempt to follow the river at all.

Any helicopter with more than 1 engine can route over the city (subject to clearances obv).

[anonymous-user]

wolves_wanderer said:

Any helicopter with more than 1 engine can route over the city (subject to clearances obv).

Yep aware of that, just unusual.
I guess that's what happens when you let colonials fly aircraft....
"Follow the big wide wet bit.......ah bks, go where you want"

[Redwing]

z4chris99 said:

unrelated but why does it stink of burnt plastic tonight?

This is people burning the cover off wire that they have stolen so that they can then melt the wire down!

[Mr_B]

The Yanks do fly over the city from time-to-time. Friend on mine was on one of these MH-53 Pavelows a few years back on their final flight before heading to the Bone Yard. They flew from Mildenhall down through over Cambridge and East Anglia before heading down the Thames and then out to the English Channel. Of course, being Americans they set up a flare path out there and had one last go on using up the miniguns.