DD_Bongodriver

Sorry but I'm clinging on to that airplane like an eco protestor to a motorway gantry.

This journey started early this year. kept it quiet so not to jinx it. this could all end suddenly but wow what an amazing feeling it is.

I was speaking to Pete Kynsey over a pint the other day and he was suggesting that they have found another airfield that fits the requirements for holding a Legends for next year (no one ever thought Sywell would really work). wouldn't/couldn't say where that was but it's at least a positive indication. On the flip side if this new location doesn't work out it sounds like Legends is never going to happen again. at least not in the UK.

Doesn't look good. Flying Legends 2022 Cancelled | Flying Legends

I may be able to add to this conversation, You guys haven't seen much of me because I have slumped into a gloomy depression because I too have a Quest 2. absolutely gorgeous piece of tech but sadly requires one of those sinister Sci-fi super AI mega-computers to run DCS, My GTX970 just ain't cutting it.....on the other hand IL2 great battles seems to run. P.S. Welcome seagoon, Don't worry about the African thing. I have got away with it for a while.

I recall it turned out to be a simple gasket leak and the aircraft was flying the next day. 'RATS' was the pilot and he seemed pretty casual about it.

Reminds me of when this happened at Duxford.

Well so far so good, I have no idea what's changed but I don't have to keep resetting my password it seems. Thanks for getting back to me.

Problem is ongoing, no response from Roger (hasn't read message yet).....I'm going outside to eat worms.

I don't know how much of the IWM's financial woes can be blamed on Legends of course. They have 363 days of the year when they are solely responsible for their own revenue.

OK, a bit of clarification here. Flying Legends actually generates zero revenue for the IWM, the deal has always been the Fighter collection took every penny from admissions and also the stall holders. basically the Fighter collection took ownership of the entire IWM Duxford site for the airshow and they did not pay for that privilege. the only revenue stream for IWM during flying legends actually came from my mob at Classic Wings through our partnership contract as the Fighter collection never contacted us to operate during legends. This opens the question of whether the fighter collection will ever find such a sweet deal elsewhere and perhaps we will yet see Legends at Duxford if they can knock out a mutually beneficial deal. I think that would be the wise thing to do.

Can't see it being practical, Air Ambulance and police helicopters might not be compatible. proximity to Stansted and surrounding airspace are issues.

It gets better, you know that electric bus they run to bus the public up and down the museum site? yeah they even ran the schedule the entire time the museum was closed. I also hate to criticise the airfield manager because he is a friend I have known for years but he really should concentrate on managing the airfield and not arse kissing his way into becoming a display pilot using his position as leverage.

Yeah I heard there was an issue but ultimately it doesn't necessarily mean it won't happen. but lately it has felt that everything the IWM do should have the Laurel and Hardy theme tune played with it. they really can't blame loss of revenue on things like Flying Legends when they made the decision to retain all staff during the COVID lockdown without anybody being furloughed, that's 2 shifts of firefighters and a full compliment of ATC staff to man a closed airfield. and then there's the overpaid and clueless civil service management that make these decisions.

Duxford are planning to build a hotel on site.

No change other than the Legends slot being filled by another Duxford hosted event. They will have to ensure there is no clash with whatever arrangements TFC make or there won't be any aircraft available. As I said the IWM have lost interest in catering to crusty old WWII enthusiasts so that may not matter to them, it will be civil stunt planes and kids everywhere.

Honestly this has come as a shock, there was no rumour circulating as far as I knew. on the other hand the financial woes of the IWM have been no secret, they really are in trouble. It has also been a general feeling that the IWM being run by civil service bureaucrats have little interest in catering to WWII aviation enthusiasts and.....sorry to use this phrase....are going a bit 'woke'

Where will it go? My guesses: Sywell or Headcorn.

Gotta get up early to catch Blubear. just seen the other thread.

Just read it on the Fighter collections facebook page, announcement from Nick Grey. they will look for another venue but it doesn't make any assurance that there will be future Legends.

Chrome says my connection to this site is not secure, could that be part of the issue?

My lockdown flight siming Utopia ended abruptly with a mass of hardware problems (resolved now I hope) Oh boy I swear I am cursed. I will check in the anorak if you hand in that joke book.

Just a small anorakish observation, the convention for US 'N' registrations is to have an N with no hyphen followed by a number and then letters, the DD's squadron number could be a suitable inclusion in this case. So Pooka could be N9DDP

Nope, logged myself out and couldn't log back on.....reset, rinse, repeat.....bugger!

I may have fixed it, never stayed logged on for this long before so something has changed. I think it might have been something to do with the google chrome stored passwords function, I noticed I had one for this site so deleted it.