Something to look out for if you are in the area – one of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight‘s Spitfire planes will be making a flypast over North London on Saturday afternoon (25th June).
It will swoop down over the RAF Museum in Hendon, before heading over towards Stanmore. The BBMF doesn’t say what it’s target location is, but I gather from a bit of sleuthing (aka, Google), that St Johns School Stanmore is having a summer fete, and expects the plane to fly overhead.
Looking at the flight plan for the day, I would guess that the plane will fly in from the North-East over the RAF Museum (at 13:25), then head northwards to the School (at 13:30) then continuing northwards to its next target.
Incidentally, although a lot of the BBMF flypasts are for military-related venues, did you know that anyone can ask for a flypast – and if they have something planned in the area, then they might arrange a short diversion just for you.
Even more surprisingly, anyone can ask for a flypast by the Red Arrows.
Realistically, you have far more chance with the BBMF as they do a lot of flypasts during the summer months, while the Red Arrows do very few in the UK and those few tend to be for larger events.
Applying for a Red Arrows flypast on the same day you know they in the South East will boost your chances – for example, on the Queen’s Official Birthday, the Southend, Clacton or Eastbourne Airshows, or the Goodwood Festival. All of them usually have the Red Arrows do a flypast, so they are in the South East of England and might pop by to say hello if you ask very nicely.
Equally, you’ll have more chance of getting a flypast from the BBMF if you ask for “A weekend in June 2012” rather than a specific date and plan your event around their availability.
It is just the effort of a quick email/message and you never know, they might just say YES.
Applications to the Red Arrows need to be sent by September, and for the BBMF by October for the following year.