Cool things seen on FlightRadar

[yellowjack]

ducktail_2.7 said:

yellowjack said:

I can't see it on Flightradar now, but a short while ago I'm sure a Short Skyvan flew directly over my house and crossed the coast on a heading that suggested France, or the Channel Islands.

Headed into Hurn and apparently did some parachute drops. Think it's still there now but not 100% sure.

Ah, Thanks! I'd not thought about wind direction. Maybe it was heading around for Runway 08. Or on it's way to make a drop. Certainly surprised me to see a Skyvan when I heard it and looked up.

[yellowjack]

MarkwG said:

ecsrobin said:

RosscoPCole said:

Look what I've just seen flying over Poole.

Quite common to be used for parachute training out of Brize to cover the shortage of larger aircraft to train from. Appears to have been working with the chaps based in Poole, maybe into stud land bay?

Local FB group has it dropping just by the airport, into a sports centre apparently: I heard it chug past, didn't see it, though.

If correct, that would have to be what is now the University sports centre, probably the big field out back where my son's archery club shoot.

[MarkwG]

yellowjack said:

ducktail_2.7 said:

yellowjack said:

I can't see it on Flightradar now, but a short while ago I'm sure a Short Skyvan flew directly over my house and crossed the coast on a heading that suggested France, or the Channel Islands.

Headed into Hurn and apparently did some parachute drops. Think it's still there now but not 100% sure.

Ah, Thanks! I'd not thought about wind direction. Maybe it was heading around for Runway 08. Or on it's way to make a drop. Certainly surprised me to see a Skyvan when I heard it and looked up.

Yep, Bournemouth landing/departing 08 yesterday. It did a couple of trips, including one out to Bovington, which took it right after departure, west over the chain ferry to Wareham.

[edit to fix error, which rendered it incomprehensible]

Edited by MarkwG on Thursday 29th April 14:16

[Chimune]

Comet just arrived at Newcastle

[Burrow01]

At least six Dasault Falcons with similar registrations fl (G-FRAI, FRAS, FRAJ etc) flying over Northern England at the moment, anyone have any idea what they would be doing?

[ecsrobin]

Burrow01 said:

At least six Dasault Falcons with similar registrations fl (G-FRAI, FRAS, FRAJ etc) flying over Northern England at the moment, anyone have any idea what they would be doing?

Cobham operate jets to train the RAF in the D323 danger area complex. They also fly out of Hurn to support the navy. Pretty much a daily (Mon - Fri) occurrence.

[LP12]

Cobham, now known as Advvent International, operates Falcons out of Bournmouth/Hurn and Teesside.

The Hurn jets basically replicate what FRADU used to do - ie the 'Thursday War' acting as an airbone training threat to the Navy.

The Teesside jets replicate what 360 Sqn used to do - that is acting in the Electronic Warfare role (both ECM and ECCM), to povide training for the RAF.

[PRTVR]

ecsrobin said:

Burrow01 said:

At least six Dasault Falcons with similar registrations fl (G-FRAI, FRAS, FRAJ etc) flying over Northern England at the moment, anyone have any idea what they would be doing?

Cobham operate jets to train the RAF in the D323 danger area complex. They also fly out of Hurn to support the navy. Pretty much a daily (Mon - Fri) occurrence.

Also operate out of teesside Airport against primarily the RAF.
http://www.dtvmovements.co.uk/index.html

[ecsrobin]

PRTVR said:

Also operate out of teesside Airport against primarily the RAF.
http://www.dtvmovements.co.uk/index.html

First part of my quote minus the teeside bit.

[yellowjack]

Burrow01 said:

At least six Dasault Falcons with similar registrations fl (G-FRAI, FRAS, FRAJ etc) flying over Northern England at the moment, anyone have any idea what they would be doing?

The 'FRA' part of the registrations is a nod to Sir Alan Cobham's company 'Flight Refueling Limited' - the pioneers of in-flight refueling. In the 1980s that became FR Aviation, which was the company name when the FRADU contract started and the Falcons were initially leased, and then purchased. The FR Aviation name was ditched in the 90s because in-flight refueling was no longer the main focus of the business.

I don't have a great deal of contact with him, but my brother-in-law works for Cobham at Hurn on the contracts side.

As an aside, the BBMF Lancaster, PA474, went (on loan) to Flight Refueling Ltd at Tarrant Rushton in 1952. It was earmarked for conversion to a pilotless drone, but that work went ahead on an Avro Lincoln instead.

[LP12]

yellowjack said:

The 'FRA' part of the registrations is a nod to Sir Alan Cobham's company 'Flight Refueling Limited' - the pioneers of in-flight refueling. In the 1980s that became FR Aviation, which was the company name when the FRADU contract started and the Falcons were initially leased, and then purchased. The FR Aviation name was ditched in the 90s because in-flight refueling was no longer the main focus of the business.

No. Flight Refuelling Ltd started in the 1950's. It was NEVER part of FRADU (Fleet Requirements and Air Direction Unit).
Furthermore FR did NOT take over the FRADU role until the mid / late 90s.

Edited by LP12 on Thursday 29th April 23:13

[HM-2]

LP12 said:

No. Flight Refuelling Ltd started in the 1950's. It was NEVER part of FRADU (Fleet Requirements and Air Direction Unit).
Furthermore FR did NOT take over the FRADU role until the mid / late 90s.

Edited by LP12 on Thursday 29th April 23:13

This is largely accurate, except it was the 1930s, not 1950s, that Flight Refuelling Ltd was founded. And I think it was the 80s, not 90s, they won the contract to run FRADU services (which were initially run by Airwork for the RN)

Edited by HM-2 on Thursday 29th April 23:18

[LP12]

HM-2 said:

This is largely accurate, except it was the 1930s, not 1950s, that Flight Refuelling Ltd was founded. And I think it was the 80s, not 90s, they won the contract to run FRADU services.

In terms of in flight refuelling they didn't get it started successfully until the the 1950s.

In terms of taking on the support for the Armed Services I can not speak for FRADU, but in terms of tne RAF it was ealy 1990s.

Edited by LP12 on Thursday 29th April 23:31

Edited by LP12 on Thursday 29th April 23:41

[yellowjack]

LP12 said:

In terms of in fule refuellinh they didn't get it started successfully until the the 1950s.

In terms of taking on the support for the Armed Services I can not speak for FRADU, but in terms of tne RAF it was ealy 1990s.

Except that they were topping up Imperial Airways flying boats for transAtlantic trips before WW2 began.

All you need is here... http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/ops/priv/cobham-aviati... Or I could borrow my B-i-L's copy of the hefty company history book they published in-house a few years back, if that would help?

[LP12]

yellowjack said:

Except that they were topping up Imperial Airways flying boats for transAtlantic trips before WW2 began.

All you need is here... http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/ops/priv/cobham-aviati... Or I could borrow my B-i-L's copy of the hefty company history book they published in-house a few years back, if that would help?

Read what I said and then read your reference.

[CharlieH89]

Just flew overhead heading east

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_EP-3

Interesting plane and use.

[red_slr]

Just flown right over me too, very loud even at 250.
Must have been one long trip !

[yellowjack]

LP12 said:

yellowjack said:

Except that they were topping up Imperial Airways flying boats for transAtlantic trips before WW2 began.

All you need is here... http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/ops/priv/cobham-aviati... Or I could borrow my B-i-L's copy of the hefty company history book they published in-house a few years back, if that would help?

Read what I said and then read your reference.

Look, you said "No". But your comprehension skills are lacking, in my opinion. You've read what I've written and taken from it something that I don't think is there. So it's unlikely that we're going to agree, and I'm not going to derail the thread by arguing over it. Suffice to say that the 'FRA' part of the registrations of those Falcon jets refers to FR Aviation. A direct successor to Sir Alan Cobham's FR Ltd by name change. The letters 'F', 'R', and 'A' appeared, in that order, as a logo/livery on the Dassault Falcon fleet when they were first introduced to carry out the FRADU contract work. It was meant as a reply to a poster who commented on the similarity of the registrations, and I thought it might interest people on here to have a starting point to type into Google.

In the early days the Faclon fleet had American registrations too...






In his book 'Wings over Dorset' author Leslie Dawson (no mother-in-law jokes please!) says...

"Flight Refueling won the FRADU contract in 1984, taking control of twenty-one Hunters and Canberras at Yeovilton. FR Aviation came to Hurn in 1985, the airfield division of the company operating sixteen specially equipped Dassault Falcon jets with a variety of aircraft involved with maritime surveillance, air defence and weapons systems training, while commencing executive charter during 1988 with Falcon and Cessna Conquest aircraft."

And the assertion that in-flight refuelling wasn't perfected until the 1950s? A non-stop freight service was flown (by British South American Airlines... https://www.airliners.net/photo/Flight-Refuelling/... ) to Bermuda in 1947, using "looped hose" Lancaster tankers flown out of Santa Maria. And in 1948 BOAC ran a winter freight service with the same method. But the coming of the jet age knocked that programme back. Sir Alan Cobham bought all the Lancaster refuelling equipment from the Air Ministry at scrap prices and bought "his" company back from Shell for a nominal sum, but they employed only 50 people and were close to going bust. A USAF order for 200 sets of refuelling equipment (for the B-36) saved the company, and then they did OK supplying tankers and aircrew for the Berlin Airlift in 1949, 15 aircraft delivering 7 million gallons of fuel (80% of the petrol supplied to Berlin).

'Probe and drogue' type refuelling was up and running by 1949. In August that year a Meteor jet (hired from the Ministry Of Supply) was kept aloft for 12 hours, refueled by a converted Lancaster tanker...



By the Korean War (June 1950), converted B-29s were operating with three refueling drogues to deliver fighters into the Korean theatre of operations...


I've got a 24 page chapter in that Leslie Dawson book entitled "Alan Cobham and Flight Refueling, 1917 onwards". Can I fact-check anything else for you?

Edited by yellowjack on Friday 30th April 01:16

[PRTVR]

ecsrobin said:

PRTVR said:

Also operate out of teesside Airport against primarily the RAF.
http://www.dtvmovements.co.uk/index.html

First part of my quote minus the teeside bit.

It was to add more information via a link, but if no words are typed the link has to be copied and pasted, it makes it easier for people if a short sentence is added.

[Poisson96]

Does anybody know what is doing circuits at Doncaster? FR is saying blocked.