Week in brief August 12 2011

A retired RAAF F-111C ‘Pig’ has hit the road this week on the back of a flatbed trailer behind a prime mover as it made its way from RAAF Base Amberley to its new home at RAAF Base Edinburgh in South Australia. The convoy departed Amberley early Monday morning, made its way through Toowoomba, Moree, Dubbo, West Wyalong, Hay and Mildura, and was expected to arrive at Edinburgh this morning. The F-111C, serial number A8-132, had its wings and tail fin removed for the drive. Importantly, A8-132 was used by the Aircraft Research and Development Unit for flight trials out of Edinburgh between 1979 and 1988. In its 37-year RAAF career this extra special F-111C logged nearly 5000 flight hours. It will be placed on public display Edinburgh from later this year.


How’s this for a surprising find when you’re pre-flighting your aircraft? US Flying reports that an Ohio pilot about to conduct a medical flight in a Eurocopter EC 135 made a startling discovery when he found a .22 caliber round lodged in a bullet hole in the fuselage near the helicopter’s clamshell doors. The bullet was wedged in the floorboard. Apparently, someone bright spark took a pot shot at the helicopter while it was delivering a patient to a hospital in Akron on Monday. While nobody was hurt in the incident, this is ridiculous. No smart arse with a weapon ever took pot shots at Superman while he was saving a damsel in distress. No one was hurling stones at that Good Samaritan in the Bible when he was saving the day, if I remember correctly. Guess doing good deeds is getting harder and harder… .


There’s an interesting story here about the current state of General Aviation in Russia. Apparently GA in Russia has been on its death bed since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but it’s now beginning to turn around with some new legislation offering renewed hope for private pilots in the country. The story says the biggest problem for GA in Russia is that it does not exist and isn’t catered for with adequate legislation by the Russian government. And you thought our GA industry had issues… .


The Silver City Bush Treadlers cycling group has completed its marathon charity ride to raise funds for the Royal Flying Doctor Service. The group of intrepid peddlers’ 16th annual Merino Dare cycling tour covered 891.3km on a round trip from Cobar to Nymagee, Mount Hope, Willandra National Park, Ivanhoe and a number of sheep and cattle stations before returning to Cobar. The group are hoping to raise around $38,000 for the RFDS from this year’s ride. Good on them we say!


The first of more than 100 aircraft headed to Bundaberg for the forthcoming Wide Bay Australia International Airshow 2011 landed in the Queensland city yesterday. Veteran Caboolture-based pilot Ray Vuillermin, who is display director for the event, fly up early in his Chipmunk to put the finishing touches on the event. The airshow takes over Bundaberg from Friday August 19 to Sunday August 21. For more info click here.


A Chicago pilot flying her 1941 Piper Cub, which was awarded best-in-class honours at the recent AirVenture 2011, on a local flight got a shock when two USAF F-16s began circling her. While the jets were circling her because she had inadvertently strayed into a presidential temporary flight restricted zone after failing to check NOTAMs and flying without her radio on, 75-year-old Myrtle Rose actually thought the pilots were simply admiring how “cute” her yellow and blue Cub was. Undoubtedly with a smile on her face and unaware of the seriousness of the situation, Rose continued her flight to her home airstrip, where she was met by a bunch of police cars, which undoubtedly wiped that smile off her face.


The first production Gulfstream G280 (formerly known as the G250) is currently being outfitted and painted at Gulfstream’s Mid-Cabin Completions Center of Excellence in Dallas in preparation for delivery later this year. Experimental test pilots from Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), who manufactured the airframe, flew the super midsized biz jet from Tel Aviv to Dallas for its final phase of manufacturing.


There was something fishy reportedly going on in Kingman, Arizona last week when a number of locals phoned the UFO Reporting Centre in Washington to report that they saw a number of bright lights in the sky that they thought might be from outer space. Turns out though it was just a group of students and instructors from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University on a night flight in a fleet of seven C172s. Landing lights, not UFO lights. Good thing Mulder and Scully weren’t called out for that one… .


China is gearing up to host its first-ever GA fly-in from Sep 20-24. The fly-in is being staged in Beijing as part of an AOPA-China conference on GA issue in the country, where government and military officials will focus on the widely reported incremental relaxation of the almost prohibitive regulations that currently restrict private aviation in China. China’s airspace, predominantly under the control of the country’s military, will be gradually opened to private aviation in the coming years, paving the way for a strong GA industry to develop in the world’s most populous nation.