Vulcan XH558

I think the Chairman of Vulcan to the Sky Trust, Dr Robert Pleming lives in Alresford. Could be happy coincidence or strategically planned!

 

Footage of the Delta Lady and BBMF at Southport Airshow today

Southport Airshow Sept 9 2012 - YouTube

 

I went to Southport yesterday for the air show. I've never been before and didn't know what to expect. It was heaving! I left at 4.30 after the Vulcan had displayed and 2 hours later I finally made it on to the M6. I'll go by train if I go again!

My sister and her husband came along too. He's never seen the Vulcan flying and she's not been to an air show before. Both were in awe at the noise from it. The first couple of flypasts were little more than gliding, but then it banked round under power and the noise set car alarms off!

 

The Vulcan was spotted flying over the colliery at Foxfield Railway early afternoon yesterday heading north and very low, only a few thousand feet (almost low enough to wave at the crew!). Can't have been very efficient for fuel at the height it was at?

 

And was seen flying fairly low level along the line of the Embsay & Bolton Abbey Steam Railway some time after 16:30 towards the east, avoiding Leeds/BradfordAirport.

Presumably on her way home from Southport. The sight certainly cheered the P'Way up towards the end of a very hot day!

 

For a short hop, staying low is more efficient - climbing to altitude uses a lot of energy (=fuel) that is just wasted when you descend again. So it only makes sense to fly at altitude (and benefit from the reduced air resistance) if you spend a lot of time up up high relative to the time it takes to get there. It's why increasingly short-haul aircraft are turboprops rather than pure jets - if you are only going to get up to 10 or 11 thousand feet when flying from Manchester to London, before descending again, there is no need of the high altitude performance a jet gives. Whereas the long-haul airliner that takes you on to to the US or Far East has significant performance advantages by cruising at 30,000 feet or more, and these more than outweigh the energy cost of getting up to that height in the first place.

I believe (might be wrong, I'm going from distant memory) one of the reasons the first Black Buck Vulcan mission to the Falklands was so marginal for fuel (they basically used far more than they calculated, and on several occasions were very close to running out of fuel) was because the Vulcan kept descending to hit their tanker, then climbing back up again to their "optimal" cruising altitude. On the subsequent missions, they worked out they would actually use less fuel by staying at the same height as the tankers even though that wasn't the the most efficient cruising altitude for the Vulcan. The tankers needed to fly and refuel relatively low because the precision control was better in relatively thicker air - so refuelling couldn't easily take place at the optimum cruising altitude for either aircraft, because in the very thin air at high altitude, it was difficult to accurately position the two aircraft within the couple of feet tolerance relative to each other for periods of 20 minutes or so at a time.

Tom

 

Also the Vulcan flies to VFR rules & regs, hence why they can fly low & why they tend to transit up & down over the East of the country to avoid large built up areas, especially since she's been based at Doncaster.

 

It is good that XH558 has been out and about this summer earning some appearance money, after the unfortunate double engine change required earlier in the year. Keeping this aircraft flying though does eat money at an enormous rate, so I think the moral has to be "enjoy it in the air while you can" !

 

They are currently fundraising to pay for the fuel for round Britain tour projected for the end of September, details on their website and Facebook.
Colin.

 

Seen it several times over the past couple of weeks, I live south of Donny and apparently one of the pilots lives in the next village.

 

Weather.... etc... permitting it's out tomorrow on a tour. www.vulcanforthesky.org

 

Link not working?

 

Try this...

Home | Vulcan To The Sky

James at SVN

 

Thanks - no mention of anything tomorrow that I can find though?

 

Sheff, You'll want this page.
Newsbytes

 

Thanks Bill. I see she's coming to Coventry, but I would have missed her, as the web site is about as much use as some of our heritage rail efforts then!

 

Thanks for the link BillR looks like she will be coming near Bedford so hope to get to see

 

Check out their Twitter feed tomorrow for updates on the flight.
Expected to leave Doncaster at 15:00
https://twitter.com/xh558

 

The Vulcan over Filton c. 4 pm.

Avro Vulcan Flypast at Filton - a set on Flickr

Just seen a clip on Points West BBC News.