Blue Eagles

Associated sites:
Army Historic Aircraft Flight | The Museum of Army Flying | Army Air Corps Recruiting

Blue Eagles Team News #5

Time for another update.

The Press Day for The Festival of Speed was held in London at The Royal Hospital, Chelsea and later at The Bluebird Club in the Kings road. The Team Manager and Media Liaison rep were accompanied by Sgt Julie Wiles and an interloper from the AAC Historic Aircraft Flight SSgt ‘Scottie’ Macrae. This was a very interesting and productive day enabling the team to make some excellent media contacts that will undoubtedly prove very valuable through the season. The highlight for Julie Wiles was the meeting she had with Jamiroquoi star – JK, who regaled her with his ambitions to buy and fly a Gazelle of his own. JK is a fan of the team and several possible plots were hatched that afternoon.

According to the briefing we heard, the F of S weekend will be a fantastic venue with lots to see and do. How does a race up the Goodwood Hill, between Carl Fogerty the Super Bike champ and Ray Turner the Lynx pilot sound to you? Or if you prefer, Nick Heidfeld in the F1 Sauber against the Lynx?

Watch for news on these possibilities on this page.

Training has continued under the direction of the team leader WO2 Richie Robinson. The four Gazelle pilots are progressing very well and all have achieved a more than acceptable standard for this stage of training.The Lynx pilot Capt Ray Turner was signed off for solo (with Richie of course) continuation training. During the week before Easter break the team were seen to be practicing set piece manoeuvres from the final display routine. The opening sequence is looking particularly good, as is the Gazelle pair’s heart. Richie’s intention this year is to incorporate an increased number of Gazelle synchro pairs manoeuvres, so look out for the new display. The first opportunity to do so will be at the Team’s Press Day that is to be held at Middle Wallop on Thursday 26th April.

The general public are cordially invited to attend and view the proceedings from the confines of the Museum of Army Flying’s grounds, adjacent to the airfield.

A bout of unserviceability severely hampered the Lynx practice programme during the week following Easter, hopefully this will mean uninterrupted Lynx serviceability for the remainder of the season. Many thanks to Bristows for making an aircraft available on Friday.

The week of 23rd-27th April as I’ve already mentioned is the training week. This is the team’s opportunity to finalise all elements of the display and put the whole thing together. They will have virtually uninterrupted use of the airfield for the entire week and will be practicing four of five times a day.Each session will be preceeded and followed by intensive briefs/debriefs. Tim Callaway from DeltaWeb will be present for most of the week, updating his store of down-loadable pictures for the website so standby for some exciting new images.

During the week we will be visited by the Army’s Mobile News Team, BFBS and an un-named BBC film crew…..a secret? Yes… But not for long, read about the developments here in future updates. As I mentioned earlier we are inviting the press down on Thursday, so far we have had acceptances from a worthy list of the media including:

BBC, Meridien TV, The Times, The Sun, a whole host of local newspapers, and journos from Flypast, Air Displays, Defence Helicopter World, Aviation News, Torque Turn, Aircraft Illustrated, Flight International…the list goes on.

We will also be hosting all of our very generous sponsors, Breitling, Cotswold Essential Outdoors, DeltaWeb, Vauxhall 4×4 Club, Mobex, and Ensign.

Also present will be the winners of a competition run by the Nationwide Building Society, who are attending as our guests.

During the Press Day the team will be presented with their distinctive blue flying suits and helmets, a fitting culmination to the long weeks of training they have undergone to prepare them for the demanding task they will be undertaking throughout the coming display season.

Other news now, the merchandise has started to arrive, it is fantastic. As soon as it is all photographed it will be featured on the Shop page for you to purchase at your leisure. Credit/Debit cards will be welcome, just download an order form or phone through your order to the nice lady on the Blue Eagles Hotline – 01980-678667. Your order will be processed and the kind folks at Pooley’s will have it in the post to you as soon as they can.

Well, that’s about all for now, look forward to seeing and chatting with you at Press Day.

All best,

Colin Dunscombe

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