6P's
I was in a panic on Monday 11th April. The FA Cup semi final between Newcastle united and Manchester United was on at the Cardiff Millennium Stadium at 2pm on Sunday the 17th of April.
I Had booked out an aeroplane from the Northumbrian Flying Club, based at Newcastle International Airport. I had arranged for three Geordie mates and me to Fly down to Cardiff for the Match. They had already bought the tickets and Not bothered arranging alternate mode of transport. The reason for my panic was that I'd just read a NOTAM (notice to airmen) that Cardiff was not going to be allowing any more air traffic to land other than that traffic that had already booked a slot.
I had not booked a slot. I felt very stupid about this. I had checked and Cardiff's normal operations didn't require General Aviation (GA) to pre-book. Unfortunately, on Cup final days the traffic is a lot heavier and they did require a slot to be booked.
I rang the air traffic control tower at Cardiff and they informed me that I did indeed need to pre-book and were not to hopeful about my chances as all slot bookings went through the airport and he thought they were all taken, but they gave me the number of the guys at Dragonfly Executive Air Charter, based at Cardiff airport and said I should give them a call.
The fella there took my details and said he'd get back to me and let me know if he could get a slot for me.
He didn't call back so at 4.30pm I rang them again, to be greeted by the answer-phone informing me that the office was shut for the day! Aaargh!
I left a message, but in my heart I knew we were screwed.
I had to hunt for alternatives. Scanning the charts I could see that Swansea was close and there was also a farm strip near Newport. Both towns had a train service, that If we landed on time would be able to get us to Cardiff in time for the game. I called Swansea and provisionally booked there because the weather forecast was not looking good for Sunday and at least they had an instrument procedure published, albeit a tricky one.
I was still worried because the procedure (NDB/DME approach) was trickier than Cardiff's one (NDB/ILS approach), which meant that I didn't want to fly if the weather was bad, and we'd only know a decent forecast at 6am on the day of departure, and by then it'd be too late to drive it!
Luckily for me whilst cycling to work on the Tuesday morning, my phone went off. It was Dragonfly, He'd had managed to get me a slot for Cardiff.
arrival slot 11.08a
I was reminded myself of the military saying, the 6P's, Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance!
The Adventure was still on!
I Had booked out an aeroplane from the Northumbrian Flying Club, based at Newcastle International Airport. I had arranged for three Geordie mates and me to Fly down to Cardiff for the Match. They had already bought the tickets and Not bothered arranging alternate mode of transport. The reason for my panic was that I'd just read a NOTAM (notice to airmen) that Cardiff was not going to be allowing any more air traffic to land other than that traffic that had already booked a slot.
I had not booked a slot. I felt very stupid about this. I had checked and Cardiff's normal operations didn't require General Aviation (GA) to pre-book. Unfortunately, on Cup final days the traffic is a lot heavier and they did require a slot to be booked.
I rang the air traffic control tower at Cardiff and they informed me that I did indeed need to pre-book and were not to hopeful about my chances as all slot bookings went through the airport and he thought they were all taken, but they gave me the number of the guys at Dragonfly Executive Air Charter, based at Cardiff airport and said I should give them a call.
The fella there took my details and said he'd get back to me and let me know if he could get a slot for me.
He didn't call back so at 4.30pm I rang them again, to be greeted by the answer-phone informing me that the office was shut for the day! Aaargh!
I left a message, but in my heart I knew we were screwed.
I had to hunt for alternatives. Scanning the charts I could see that Swansea was close and there was also a farm strip near Newport. Both towns had a train service, that If we landed on time would be able to get us to Cardiff in time for the game. I called Swansea and provisionally booked there because the weather forecast was not looking good for Sunday and at least they had an instrument procedure published, albeit a tricky one.
I was still worried because the procedure (NDB/DME approach) was trickier than Cardiff's one (NDB/ILS approach), which meant that I didn't want to fly if the weather was bad, and we'd only know a decent forecast at 6am on the day of departure, and by then it'd be too late to drive it!
Luckily for me whilst cycling to work on the Tuesday morning, my phone went off. It was Dragonfly, He'd had managed to get me a slot for Cardiff.
arrival slot 11.08a
I was reminded myself of the military saying, the 6P's, Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance!
The Adventure was still on!
posted by Karl at
1:25 AM
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