News
July 2009
With instructor and aircraft availability at a high, its been open season for all those students who have been making good progress towards their PPL award. We have been lucky to benefit from some weekday training too, thanks to Marcus and Bertie. We chose not to be represented at Families Day due to a shortage of people to stand with the aircraft and interact with the visitors and secured the aircraft over on the 31 Sqn HAS site instead. Hopefullly next year, we'll compensate by having a large presence!
June 2009
Making the most of the good weather, Gareth Prendergast achieved his first solo on the 20th so very well done to him! Force Development flying has been going well, with many Marham personnel experiencing at first hand some of the trials and tribulations of air power. We now have Marcus Palmer as a regular instructor and Ian Brett too as he gains enough 'ticks' to have his AFI status raised to FI. There's plenty of space for more students this month so if you're wavering, now is the right time to take the plunge and get well into the PPL syllabus.
March 2009
At last the weather is getting better! UU has been sold and was delivered to Blackbushe on the 15th March so there is a little more space in the hanger now. Force Development flying of Marham personnel has started up in earnest and should keep the aircraft relatively busy in the week for the rest of the year, although none is planned at weekends so no problems on the availability front! We have a new instructor - Marcus Palmer from Cottesmore and he is going to fill up several Sundays, so we should have instructors available for all of the weekends as we get into the summer months - if you were thinking of starting or re-starting your PPLs, now is the time! The club is now fully Enhanced Learning Credit and Standard Learning Credit registered, so those wishing to use these useful sources of funding are now able to.
January 2009
With apologies for no updates for a while, we're all coming out of hibernation after the cold winter and looking forward to some great flying this year! Congratulations to Darren Howett on achieving his Qualifying X-country early in Jan. The AGM went very well, with a great turn out on a cold Saturday morning. Reflecting on our position now versus last year, we do much more flying, are financially secure and have a record number of members. There was a real feeling of excitement for the year ahead with plans for overseas flying, precision flying and Air Racing not to mention provision of lots of flying for Marham duty personnel and our plans for an open day later in the year. A huge thanks goes out to everyone who has helped make the last 12 months a massive turnaround for the club.
September 2008
Congratulations to Thomas Dean for finishing his GAPAN scholarship in record time and picking up the Guild's John Landyman trophy too! We have had a few more Service personnel renew their PPLs and a modest increase in membership. The club supported the Marham Leadership, Ethos and Air Power day by giving air experience flights to about 10 personnel from across the Stn. We hope to expand this in the future and make it a regular part of life at Marham, with an ultimate aim of providing air experience to as many Marham personnel as we can. Flying rates continued to be really strong throughout the month and more details are on the Information Centre in the clubhouse. Following a change in circumstances and some clever financial juggling, it has become possible to keep our Cessna, G-JAGS at the club, replacing the previous decision to sell it. This really reflects the strong upsurge in flying and the health of the club so a huge well done and thank you to everyone who has contributed to this rapid recovery!
August 2008
August has been a great month despite the poor weather! A smattering of first-time and renewal PPLs to report as well as a real upsurge in flying resulting in our busiest month for over a year! We now have call on more instructors and so the PPL students are better able to plan their learning. For those who want it, it is possible to do a slightly more intense course of instruction, to get through the syllabus a little quicker. Anyone wanting to do this should contact the instructors direct. If you have been in the clubhouse recently, I hope you have noticed our new Information Centre - this is where you can get the key information about the club, flying hours, membership and financial position. This should be interesting to everyone as we all have an interest in how the club is performing and it should be pretty clear from the figures that we are now out of the dire straits we found ourselves in recently and are rapidly becoming a healthy and vibrant club again. Long may it continue! Following the surge in flying and revenue, we have been able to hang on to G-JAGS and it will now remain with the club....
July 2008
We have been selected by the Guild of Air Pilots and Navigators to conduct a flying scholarship for them and Thomas Dean began his flying at the end of July. The Berlin expedition was a real success and a full write-up of the weekend is in the 'Events' section. We have had both a formal inspection of the club, and a station audit and have been given a clean bill of health for the next 12 months! A web-based file sharing system will be set up in the very near future and this will allow us to hold a single point of reference for all of our documents, accessible through the internet. More details to follow by email. Now the club is back in good health, it's time to really look at getting maximum flying training done, enjoying some fly-outs and maybe getting a competition team back together. More details to follow......
June 2008
June has mostly been about re-configuring the club to try to make us more fun, efficient and yes, profitable! Quite a few irons are in the fire right now to firmly set us back on the tracks and get the club 'flying' again. We are actively recruiting instructors to make sure we have plenty of flying training going on and are looking at several fly-outs, including a expedition to Berlin!
May 2008
May sees the arrival of a new Cessna, G-AWUU which joins us from Waddington to replace G-BLACS (going to Honington) and G-JAGS (being sold). Also, the stand-up of the new look web site, hope you like it!