BBMF Experience Day 2018

Header image: ‘Experience Day’ prize winner, Martin Wright (left) and his guests get up close to the action and the noise with the BBMF at RAF Coningsby on 17th June. (All photos: Clive Rowley)

RAF Memorial Flight Official Club member Martin Wright, from Salisbury, was the lucky winner of the Club ballot prize for April, an ‘Experience Day’ at the BBMF. Martin spent the day at the BBMF’s home at RAF Coningsby on Sunday 17th June and brought along as his guests his father, Stephen, and his younger brother, Ashley, (both of whom are also Club members) as well as friend David Hoskins.

The group were allowed special access to the RAF Station at Coningsby and were hosted by former OC BBMF and your Club publications editor, Clive Rowley.

The weather on the day was kind and the BBMF flying programme included several ‘out and back’ sorties: the Lancaster completed six flypasts at various venues including over veterans participating in ‘Project Propeller’ at Halfpenny Green west of Birmingham, a Spitfire and Hurricane duo (MK356 and PZ865) were tasked with eight flypasts at various events and a separate solo Spitfire (AB910) displayed at the Haven Great Yarmouth Air Show.

Martin and his guests experienced a typical BBMF flying day from ‘behind the scenes’. They toured the BBMF HQ and met the Flight’s ground crew and pilots on duty that day. They were even able to help in pushing out the two Spitfires and the Hurricane from the BBMF hangar. They watched the aircrew crew-in to their aircraft and observed them start-up and taxy from a close and privileged standpoint. They also got personal flypasts as the BBMF aircraft departed the airfield or returned for a ‘hangar break’. In addition, they were able to explore the inside of the BBMF Dakota ZA947 whilst the flying aircraft were away.

Martin said: “The day was far more than we expected and beyond, it was utterly unreal. Words can't really describe what I witnessed and did. It was an unbelievable day.”

This is the third year that we’ve been able to provide an ‘Experience Day’ at the BBMF as one of the Club’s ballot prizes. Hopefully, we’ll be able to do the same again next year for another lucky member.