When I went to Northolt in early May for the Fly Navy 100 celebrations I'd heard whispers of an exclusive event on Friday 5th June for a band of twenty or so photographers. They would have access to the base and be allowed to photograph the arriving aircraft which were participating in the weekend’s Families' Day and photocall. “I’ll have some of that” I thought. Exclusive events are all too scarce in this country and unless you have some very good connections you are always going to be amongst many, many other photographers. This is fine but when you are looking for something a bit different, these kinds of events are a must. Whether that happens or not is another matter but nothing ventured nothing gained and all that.
So off I trotted back to my trusty PC and placed a bid to attend the event, a few weeks later I was pleased to learn that my bid had been successful. Fantastic news for me, err, not so good for the others. You see I have got myself a bit of an unfortunate reputation, one I never wanted and one which I try to refute, but in the words of Crowded House, everywhere I go, I always take the weather with me!!
Two years ago I contracted the cloud seeding virus, I caught it from a pair of fast jet deflector trousers I bought in the Army & Navy stores. In fact I often wear these when I go to the Machynlleth Loop and they are tremendously effective. I did try to shake off the virus and eventually passed it to Paul Dunn, he in turn passed it to Karl Drage who then passed it back to me. That’s what friends are for, apparently.
Needless to say, if you see me at an event, expect cloud. If Karl’s with me, expect rain too. If Karl, Paul and I are all together, you'd best get off home now!
I think (and hope) it’s just the nature of this country’s weather but to be honest, sometimes I do wonder. I knew it was a bad omen when it had been 26 degrees celsius the week before, more than five days of heat in this country and it always goes to pants! Friday 5th June 2009, the weather was pants. Not just ordinary pants, but grey claggy, wet, soggy pants. Who wants pants like that , hey?
I’m sure I was meant to be mentioning a photocall, Ah yes, where was I?
We arrived at the main gate around 9.30 and were greeted by a man I thought wouldn’t be there. Phil Dawe, organiser of all the Northolt photocall events and thoroughly nice chap, was in a bad way a week or so before, having suffered a heart-attack. He greeted us with tales of medical miracles at the hands of the very best practitioners in the land and his retort to one person's enquiry as to his wellbeing, “Well, I’m not ****ing dead!” will long remain in my mind. It made me laugh that did.
By the time we arrived on location it had already started raining but undeterred we set up camp (one chair and an umbrella, quite a settlement) and got the gear ready. A number of business jets were present including Gulfstream IV and Vs, several Cessna Citations and a number of Dassault Falcons of various models. With an embargo on civillian movements in place from 1200, these promptly began to depart, and from these movements we got a feel for the kind of shots available, for departures! Sadly we were here for arrivals so the high impact, “in your face” type of shot was only available for leavers not landers……at this stage of the day anyway! This was to alter later in the day as a runway change was in order and some of the aircraft obliged by rolling almost the entire length of the runway and passing very close by. Because of the close proximity to London's Heathrow airport, any runway changes there have to be mirrored by Northolt, regardless of whether that keeps movements arriving and departing into wind or not.
No 32 (The Royal) Squadron’s Agusta A109 helicopters were busy and provided some great photo opportunities whilst we waited for the first arrivals, along with the resident BAe 125s. Indeed, one of the A109s was sporting seldom seen flotation equipment as its tasking was to transport VIPs to the weekend's D-Day celebrations. It was still raining by the way.
Having to resort to my trusty umbrella to protect my valuable equipment didn’t really come as a surprise. However, pouring water into my friends camera bag did for him. It was an accident, honest. Well the first time it was at least. You’ve got to keep yourself entertained after all.
The first proper arrival was a lovely Bell 47 Sioux, G-MASH (cough, sorry), registered in recognition of the excellent US TV series M*A*S*H about the Korean War, in which the type featured prominently, and an aircraft I had never seen before, in fact it was a day of quite a few firsts for me. Never before seen through my rain soaked camera lens were an HH-60G Pave Hawk from the 56th RQS, 48th FW at RAF Lakenheath and two 8 Flight, AAC helicopters from Hereford; a Eurocopter AS365N2 Dauphin and an Agusta A109, the latter of which was captured during the Falklands conflict in 1982.
As the day went on we did have good RAF participation in the form of a Tornado F.3 from 111 Sqn, "The Tremblers" from RAF Leuchars (who will, in less than six weeks time, become the sole remaining RAF operator of the type), a Tornado GR.4 (apparently from 14 Sqn at RAF Lossiemouth, but who can tell in these days of pooled aircraft and very few markings?), a Hawk from 100 Sqn at RAF Leeming, a King Air from 45(R) Sqn at RAF Cranwell and a Tucano from 207(R) Sqn, 1 FTS at RAF Linton-On-Ouse, all of which were welcome participants. Another "bonus" RAF item came by way of Sqn Ldr Ian "Smithy" Smith in the BBMF's Spitfire PR.19, who performed a mid-afternoon display to the Officers' Mess, which conveniently happened to place it right over our heads for most of the duration!
Other highlights for me were the Irish Air Corps Eurocopter AW-139 and the OV-10 Bronco, owned and flown by Tony de Bruyn. This aircraft had just come out of the paint shop and had been picked up from Holland to be flown to Northolt. SES Ambulances Ltd had very kindly donated a ceremonial sword to be engraved with the name of the participant best demonstrating the "Spirit of the event", and for the lengths that Tony went to to get his aircraft to Northolt, he was deemed to be most deserving of the award. He also received a miniature version to keep as a memento.
The daytime event eventually turned into a nightshoot, the lights at Northolt being a rather nice white shade rather than the usual sodium orange glare. Sadly, as I departed the day event, I left the rain and wind for the nightshooters to contend with, sorry about that guys.
Despite the weather this was a great event and the donations raised by the auction will go to the charities supported by RAF Northolt. I personally really enjoyed the day as it was spent with good people quite a few of whom I had already met - they knew about my cloud attracting properties so they’ve only got themselves to blame! What more can I say?