Thetownend.com

Having flown the Hercules for a number of years out of Lyneham, it is with a heavy heart that I say farewell to the C-130 fleet from tomorrow.

They will be missed, not only by the people of 'Bassett'. 

It won't be the same without you.

God speed to all those who have flown from the Base and will continue to fly from Brize Norton. My thoughts are also with the families of the crew lost in Iraq.

It was an honour to fly with you.

Goodbye Fat Albert.

I quite liked seeing them around. Shame they had to leave Wiltshire.

Was driving into Swindon when i saw the last three doing there flyover this afternoon.
In close formation...a splendid sight.

The goodbye flyover is tomorrow, a lap of Wiltshire starting at 10:30ish

 :hmmm:Practise?

My Dad was an Air Traffic Controller at Lyneham in the 1980s.  Remember a lot of the history of the station from back then...the pivotal role Lyneham and the Hercs played in the Falklands War with the flights down to Ascension Island being the main one.

I can also remember watching the live broadcast as John McCarthy flew in to Lyneham in 1991 after his 5 years of captivity in Lebanon.  We were living in Freshbrook at the time, and just as the TV commentary announced that he was 5 to 10 mins from landing, my Dad leapt up and took us out in to the back garden.  Sure enough...there was the Herc flying overhead on its descent in to Lyneham.

And one other memory!  We went to one of the family open days, again in the late 1980s.  The star attraction was a ride in a Herc for any Forces family who wanted to go up.  Hard to believe in today's Health & Safety conscious times, but they put something like 50 or 60 of us in the back of the hold and strung something resembling a tennis net across to keep everyone back from the open door at the back...and then flew us around for 15 or 20 mins.  I'm not making this up.  No seat belts or harnesses.  Just a crowd of adults and kids standing up in the back of a plane with its cargo doors wide open.  I was probably 14 or 15.  Brilliant.

Possibly, they are doing a low level flypast in formation.

Last route update I saw (approx timings):

1030 hrs (Depart) Lyneham heading via west of Hullavington
1041hrs Colerne
Warminster
Trowbridge
Melksham/Devizes
Calne
1100hrs Chippenham
Lyneham Village
Wootton Bassett
Blunsdon area of Swindon/Shrivenham
1120hrs (Wheels down) Brize Norton

(don't blame me if its wrong!).

Absolutely true.

I started off in Air Traffic in 1978 before going Aircrew,  I too remember the families days. Before going Aircrew I took my family on a familiarisation flight over the local area. You're absolutely right, just a net between the pax and a Board of Enquiry!!


It was great fun as a 'Loadie' watching the mums turn green but refusing to give in and throw up!!

I saw them today & will make sure we all go outside work tomorrow & watch
Although none of my family served there growing up in Calne meant I went to school with many Lyneham kids & vividly remember going up to Lyneham when Terry Waite flew in to tie ribbons on trees
Used to love going to the open days & going up in the Hercules & was lucky enough to do it again last year - I feel extremely lucky to have done that

Having grown up in Goatacre, right next to the base, it's very sad to see them go. And I'm gutted I won't be there tomorrow to see the flyover.

Although I am currently in South-West Oxfordshire, so you never know...

Guess I'll be fighting my way through crowds and news crews on my drive to work tomorrow then.

I'll stick my head out of the office and have a butchers though.

Oh yeah your in Calne now right? How's it going?

Remember that happening on Family's days back in the 70's as well.  I also remember  around 1973/74? seeing  Archbishop Makarios (who was here because of all the stuff going on in Cyprus.), come hurtling out of the main gates with his entourage, and Concord flying into Lyneham around 69/70. When we got there they still had the Brittania's( 54 (Sqdn), Argosy's and the Comet's (216 sqdn) Managed to wangle a flight on a Comet when in the air cadets. Good times. I know the Herc's are only moving up the road but am going to miss seeing them flying around regularly. Just hope they find a good use for the airfield.

Yep. It's going fantastically, thanks.

"Oh yeah your in Calne now right? How's it going?"

Fucking Calne and people from it...

I lost my brother on XV193 when it went down in Scotland in 1993.  End of an era for me as I think of him whenever they fly over.  I have flown on them numerous times and have attended many occaisions at Lyneham.

They will be missed for sure, sad day!

I spent 7 years working on the C-130 programme and have extremely fond memories of Fat Albert and the personnel who both flew and supported the platforms. Sad day for the local community, but the base infrastructure is in a generally shocking state of disrepair.

Still, the residents of Carterton will love the 24/7 flying now in place at BZN......

At least we still have Des!

Really sorry to hear that.  That's tragic.  (I don't suppose the play off win even registered for you.  Puts it all in to perspective, that's for sure.)

The farewell flight very helpfully just went right over my house and garden in Devizes. I will miss them, they have been part of the soundtrack of my life.

Just gone over blunsdon 5min ago.

Bah, didn't come over the Dorcan area. Waited outside for about 20 minutes :(

Just had them fly over my work. I don't know how to put photo's up but anyone on my facebook feel free to take the one i just shared and put it up here.

done

[url width=540 height=720]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/magicroundabout/9867f4ba.jpg[/url]

Ace, cheers.

Cheers Buddy

no worries. cracking shot. Must have beenan epic sight watching them fly over.

I work around north Wiltshire so popped to Bradenstoke to watch the four of them take off. The Hercules is one of those planes with character that I never get bored of seeing. A sad day for Lyneham and Wiltshire.

My Uncle served with the Hercules Maintenance Fleet at RAF Lyneham for years (before shooting off to another now closed based, Laarbruck).

I've very happy memories of the family days and standing green-faced behind 'the net' (never been a good flyer) during the flights around Wilts.

Not having Fat Albert circling my days at the CG will be a bit of a shame. End of an era.

Thanks to all that served us from Lyneham and best of luck for the future to those that continue to serve from bases far and wide.

Rubbish pilots...  Get myself set for a nice shot of them coming over the white horse and the cunts turn in too early and miss it by half a mile to the right.......



                                                                                      ↓↓↓    You should have been here...

[url width=800 height=415]http://gallery.me.com/paul.rossiter/100124/_MG_9924/web.jpg?ver=13095233500001[/url]





<<<<< the white horse is that way you twats...

[url width=800 height=544]http://gallery.me.com/paul.rossiter/100124/_MG_9938/web.jpg?ver=13095229980001[/url]

Photoshop is your friend......

I phoned them and got them to fly round again...

[url width=800 height=533]http://gallery.me.com/paul.rossiter/100124/PS9924/web.jpg?ver=13095329470001[/url]

And they did it in the exact same formation as before, that's good of them

And the white horse stayed still as well

Wow that looks great - didn't get the best view from the leisure centre as they followed the main road through town but looked great coming over the downs

Going to be strange not having them flying over my house all the time. Got so used to it over the years. Have they decided what they are doing with Lyneham yet?

No, they are hoping for some news Army wise over the summer, but that didn't seem like a hard deadline and the base doesn't close until the end of 2012

Bloke who owns the land wants to build a theme park.

Eddie Shah, but I don't think he owns the land.

I can't figure out why nobody is proposing that it becomes a commercial airport. With all the problems that are had getting new runways built, you'd have thought that converting an existing one that is big enough to take passenger jets would be a no brainer.

Wasn't it looked at a few years back? there's no way Lyneham would cope unless there is an extra motorway junction on the M4. The roads in and out would never sustain a commerical airport.

When I was little and we used to go on holiday I never used to understand why we couldn't fly from Lyneham  :-[

The roads around Bristol Airport are crap (just saying it didnt stop them, no proper link to the motorway). Thats why Id rather use Heathrow.

Speaking to an ex RAF fella today, he thinks it will be mothballed for 2 years next year, but in 2014 the army are withdrawing from Germany, so it may well become a Squaddie base.

Virgin have tried

I missed them. And judging by the way they flew over the downs in that photo, they would've gone near enough right over the office.

Even the proposal to build a new motorway junction seems ambitious given the state of the land between the M4 and Lyneham - not sure any road up Dauntsey Banks could cope with the traffic, given that there's constant subsidence already.

I always said ditching the navigator was a bad idea, but nobody listened.....