BBC Archives - Microlight Rally

Came across a great video the other day on the BBC website.

The footage is from 1987 and has been reclaimed and published by the blokes at the BBC archive - Fascinating to watch.

Anyway, the 30 minute film is about a Microlight rally from Cumbria to the East coast of England. Back then Microlight Flying was still in its infancy, but nevertheless was established enough to have capable airworthy aircraft available.

Most of the trikes shown are old Mainair Flash 1s which were probably top-of-the-range back then. There are still plenty of them about and flying!

We can't embed the link into the blog, so we will just have to link to it from here

Cheers, Victor

Test Success and Elvis-Leg re-appears!

Hello All and Happy New Year,

Its been some time since our last post (which was more of a plug for our gift vouchers for Christmas - Sorry!)
And we have been fairly busy with things at the field.

Regular visitors from elsewhere should be aware that runway 12/30 is no longer in use - at least for the Winter anyway. Instead, we have a new all-weather runway running 16/34. Work isn't 100% complete, so pilot briefing is essential before coming into land with prior permission required at all times.

Apart from that it's been great weather the past while and we have managed to get another two guys through their Flying Test. Congratulations to Steve Hardman and Mike O'Brien, both have put a lot of effort into getting their license with long drives across the country on many occasions - so well done! We missed getting their photos for the blog, they must have been too busy making a bee-line for the pub ;-)

One of our other students went out flying with me at the weekend and seemed to develop a severe dose of Elvis-Leg. For those of you that have no idea what I am talking about, I will explain. Elvis Leg is the condition that Microlight pilots get when they are under a bit of pressure (normally caught by student pilots but sometimes older more experienced jockeys also)

The condition manifests itself by the right leg shaking similar to Elvis' leg on stage doing a dinger in his heyday. Very funny to see from the backseat, but easily resolved. Setting the hand-throttle, resting the leg and chilling out for a minute normally does it. Anyway, no shame in it Tommy we have all been there!

2009 is lining up to be a busy year ahead. The weather gods have promised us a great Spring, Summer and Autumn and we have lots planned. I will try and update regularly so keep an eye on the blog occasionally

Cheers, Victor
m:07747806029
w:www.flyni.co.uk