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Aviation History
1954
1954 - 1697.PDF
"Flight" photographs The general scene at Fairwood Common before the race started and (right) Canberra R.2s in line astern during their stimulating formation display. Dunkerley Wins Welsh Air Derby ONCE again Fred Dunkerley has literally pulled a fast one on the Royal Aero Club handicappers. On Saturday afternoon his familiar Cirrus-Gemini G-AKKB crossed the finishing line well ahead of 18 other competitors in the three- lap Welsh Air Derby, held at Fairwood Common by the Swansea and District Flying School and Club. Its owner received the D. M. Evans-Bevan 100-guinea Challenge Trophy, together with a cash prize of £100 and 22 points towards the 1954 British Air Racing Championship. Swansea was spared the thundery downpours endured by many other southern regions on Saturday, and local enjoyment of the display and the race was little affected by menacing clouds and a chill breeze. Four Canberra B.2s from Scampton provided a noisy and dramatic overture to the official opening by the Mayor of Swansea, Aid. T. S. Harris, and Mr. C. M. Colbeck, S.W. divisional con troller, M.T.C.A. Led by S/L. Howard, the team performed some really excellent close-formation and solo work despite the bumps. The standard was maintained by eight Auxiliary pilots of No. 614 (County of Glamorgan) Squadron, flying Vampires and led by S/L. Spiers. The Vampire individual aerobatic show was by F/L. Clarke, who almost demonstrated a flick roll when recovering rather smartly from an inverted shallow dive. The Auxiliaries added an effective supplement to the printed pro gramme by towing across the airfield a target flag bearing the message "Join 614 Squadron"; the tug was a Meteor 7. With well over 100 jumps to his credit, parachutist Johnny Railing made a descent that was a thoroughly professional job: he left the Auster at 2,500ft, swallow-dived for 12 seconds before taking silk and—by deft use of lift-webs—landed on a smallish patch of grass near the runway and in full view of the entire crowd. Arthur Jones, Swansea's C.F.I., ended the programme with a lively and very well assorted selection of Tiger Moth aerobatics. The Air Derby attracted a varied field—three Tiger Moths, three Geminis, two Autocrats, two Proctors and a Swallow, Mosscraft, Messenger, Hawk Trainer, Hawk Major, Chipmunk, Nighthawk, Falcon Six and Hawk Speed Six. The race consisted of three laps of a 22.53-mile quadilateral covering most of the Gower peninsula. There were hopes of a local victory—perhaps for the little B.A. Swallow flown by Arthur Jones—but conditions favoured the faster aircraft. As the race progressed, general opinion favoured "Tim" Wood's Messenger, which moved up a place in the first lap. Practically all other overtaking took place out of sight in the last lap, and Dunkerley's runaway win took most spectators by surprise. There was a neck-and-neck tussle for second place between G/C. Grece (Nighthawk) and S/L. Rush (Falcon), and most other entrants—true to handicap form —finished in a great gaggle split-seconds later. RESULTS PI. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Pilot F. Dunkerley G/C. C. fi. M. Grece S/L. J. Rush H. Wood G. R. I. Parker J. N. Somers Reg. G-AKKB G-AGWT G-AECC G-AKBO G-AHWR G-AKDN Aircraft and engine Gemini (two Cirrus Minor) Nighthawk (Gipsy Six 2) Falcon Six (Gipsy Six 1) Messenger (Cirrus Major 3) Proctor 5 (Gipsy Queen 2) Chipmunk (Gipsy Major 10C) H'cap m. s. 18 26 17 14 18 54 10 55 14 58 13 44 Speed m.p.h. 165.0 155.5 166.0 125.5 143.0 136.5 And the Weather Nearly Wins at Yeadon """THE big air display held on Whit-Monday each year at •*• Yeadon Airfield, near Leeds, under the sponsorship of the Yorkshire Evening News, seems to have incurred the permanent displeasure of the Clerk of the Weather. In 1952 there was such a high wind diat several items had to be cancelled; last year the heavens opened half-way through the programme; and this year there was an initial drizzle, followed by low cloud and poor visibility all the afternoon. In the circumstances, Air Chief Marshal Joubert, who organized and directed the show on behalf of the Soldiers', Sailors' and Airmen's Families Association—for which he is such an indefatigable worker—probably counted him self fortunate in attracting a crowd which early estimates put at no less than 50,000. At the same time, some top-rank inter national flying talent had been engaged, and expenses must have been heavy. Monday's depressions, as it happened, were country-wide, with the result that a number of formations and individual aircraft which should have been present (including one carrying two members of Flight's staff) were kept firmly clamped at their bases. Not being required to travel north under its own power, how ever, the 1909 Bleriot from the Shuttleworth Collection was among those present, as were the 1912 Blackburn monoplane and the Blackburn B.2 trainer (flown by "Doc" Watson); the first two of these precious old-timers were merely taxied (the Bleriot, in the hands of S/L. Sowrey, perhaps attained six inches of altitude), but the less venerable B.2 was duly flown. An R.A.F. Sabre got across from Linton-on-Ouse for an aero batic demonstration, and "Gerry? Smith provided a contrasting type of display in a Slingsby Sky sailplane. Four Meteors of the Royal Netherlands Air Force—in more propitious circumstances there would have been a whole squadron—demonstrated forma tion aerobatics; the Fokker S.14 jet trainer, however, was unable to make what would have been its first appearance in this country. Some Belgian Air Force F-84s were likewise absentees (as were the U.S.A.F. F-86s), but Capt. Aviateur Yves Bodart, in a Belgian Meteor 8, put on an aerobatic show to which that much-over worked description "nought feet" could, for once, have been applied with a considerable measure of truth. The Fleet Air Arm got a quartet of Seahawks through from Lossiemouth for formation aerobatics, but a RATO demonstra tion by Sea Furies was a Naval item that had to be cancelled. A Dragonfly, however, tried conclusions with a "submarine," the survivors from which were ultimately winched-up from a rubber dinghy into the helicopter. Light relief was supplied by a Yeadon club Tiger with an "invisible" pilot, and the parachute descent—without seeing which no air-display crowd would go home happy—was con tributed by Johnny Railing, who selected his alighting-spot as accurately as he had done at Swansea two days earlier. R.A.F. Vampires and Canberras also contributed formation items, so, all in all, the public had its money's worth—especially as another item which went according to programme was an aerobatic show, of characteristic brilliance, by Prince Cantacuzene in his faithful little Biicker Jungmeister biplane.
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