Dave A's Year 2015

[davidallum]

Thought I would have a go at this:

January

New Years Day FlyIn @ Popham was washed out (no change there)

Icicle Meet @ Folly Dog Leg Hungerford was graced with fog and no wind but at least 10 balloons tethered and I made 6 of them

Friday 23rd - Sunday 25th World Economic Forum @ Davos,Switzerland so three days spent at Zurich,loads of highlights but three to mention were:

UP-B5701 B757 Bek Air
EP-AJC A320 Meraj Air
YI-ASF B737 Iraqi

Only airports visited this month were Gatwick & Lasham

February

Monday 2nd to Monday 16th trip to Florida via Canada,too many highlights to mention but airports visited on this trip were:

Heathrow
St Johns
Toronto
Tampa
St Petersburg/Clearwater
Sarasota
Punta Gorda
LeHigh Acres
Fort Myers
Naples
Fort Lauderdale-Executive
Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood
Pompano Beach
Boca Raton
West Palm Beach
Miami
Opa Locka
Tamiami

All other spotting this month done from home.

March

All spotting this month done from home apart from one two hour session at Blackbushe (to take the dogs for a nice walk)

April

A lot of spotting done from home with the following airfield/airports visited:

Popham Sunday 12th (Jodel Club FlyIn)
Heathrow 17th,18th and 21st
Frankfurt 18th - 20th (highlights included my first 2 Lan Chile B787's)
White Waltham 21st (guided tour and made 2 G-A's ACGZ Moth Major and ADWT Hawk Major)

May

Saturday 2nd Microlight Trade Fair @ Popham (badly affected by the weather)
Monday 4th Aerojumble & FlyIn @ Popham made three including Cherokee OO-NZF which came in from Ostend
Tuesday 5th Day out with Rob Belcher and included my first ever visits to Dunkeswell and Exeter,also visited Old Sarum and RAE Boscombe Down
Thursday 7th Visit to Farnborough where I made 9
Sunday 10th Visit to Lasham to catch up with the Russian B757's also visited Popham for their Vintage Piper Fly In but didn't pot anything
Saturday 30th Visit to Sywell for Aero Expo,made over 130 today but main highlight was meeting Everton "Happy Days Bob"


June

Most of my spotting was done from home but did visit the following:

Sunday 7th Brimpton-Lower Wasing Farm,made a total of 4 here,love this place as you can spot without the use of optics,also it's only 4 miles from my front door
Wednesday 17th Gatwick where it was catching up on Easyjet and Norwegian then onto Toulouse for the day with Rob Belcher and Geoff Pierce for my first ever visit to the home of Airbus and ATR,including scheduled traffic I made about 130 at Toulouse 
Friday 19th Southampton where I made 1 and onwards to Guernsey for two days with two very good friends Rob Belcher and Martin Harbor for the Guernsey International air Rally,great little event where I made 75
Sunday 21st Popham (Mid Summers Day Fly In,only 1 made)

July

Again all spotting done from home until 25th where a visit to Heathrow occurred before flying off to Fiji for three weeks via Seoul,again far too many highlights to mentioned but I think the best pot for me was YJ-AV72 ATR 72 Air Vanuatu,also had three good sessions at Seoul-Incheon which has wetted my appetite for another trip to the far east

August

First two weeks spent in Fiji/South Korea
Tuesday 18th visit to Lasham for one of their gliding championships where I made 22

September

Again spent most of the month spotting from home but the following visits were made:
Friday 11th Farnborough (made 12 including PR-OFT Galaxy) Blackbushe (made 3)
Saturday 12th,another day out with Rob Belcher,Luton (made 32 including PT-FKY Falcon 2000),Dunstable (made 4) and then my first visit to Riseley-Sackville Lodge Farm where a FlyIn and a Hot Air Balloon meet were taking place (made 28)
Sunday 13th Popham,Auster Club FlyIn (made 4,highlight has to be G-CBOA Auster B.8 Agricola)
Sunday 20th Popham,Solent Aviation Society Fly In but nothing potted 

October

Sunday 4th Brimpton-Lower Wasing Farm LAA Andover Strut FlyIn,just one potted,G-ISAC ISAAC Spitfire
Sunday 11th Popham End of Season FlyIn but nothing potted
All other pots for this month were seen from home

November

Due to the crap weather only potted 6 from home until my next trip to Florida 20th November - 8th December,the following airfields were visited on this trip:
Heathrow
Toronto
Tampa
St Petersburg/Clearwater
Sarasota
Punta Gorda
Fort Myers/Florida Southwest Regional
Fort Myers/Page Field
Naples
Fort Lauderdale-Executive
West Palm Beach
Pompano Beach
Boca Raton
Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood
Miami
Opa Locka
Tamiami
Heathrow

Masses of highlights on this trip but I think the stand out memories are seeing 3 Sabreliners and 1 Jetstar flying,great sight

December

As everyone can testify the weather has been crap this month with the odd day here and there being decent but I have made 18 from home.I keep a spreadsheet of all my flights and this year has been the best one yet with 21 commercial flights being undertaken.

[davidallum]

I've finally got upto date with all of my logs for 2015 (and of course 2016) and because of all of my trips abroad I potted 5,279 frames/scrapes so obviously my best year ever,included in those totals was 2,052 airliners and 2.020 biz.

Just out of curiosity I thought I would check what I made in Florida as I was lucky enough to be able to go twice in 2015:

Feb:Total was 1,925 frames/scrapes which included 560 airliners and 980 biz

Nov/Dec:Total was 1,603 frames/scrapes which included 453 airliners and 758 biz

So you can tell that a trip to Florida will give a substantial log.

Next trip starts on Sunday 8th May with a 12 day trip to South Africa via Istanbul with Turkish Airlines,I last visited South Africa in 2006 so I'm looking forward to potting loads again.

[davidallum]

Thanks Bob,but first the Royals need to beat Cardiff at the Mad Stad tomorrow because if we lose and the teams below us win we could only be 5 points above the drop zone and we still have to play,Middlebrough,Hull and Birmingham,it's getting squeaky bum time.

With regards to the above mentioned trip,Turkish only wanted £450 including taxes for the trip,too good an offer to miss.