Chris Hasell Profile

 

BORN LONGER AGO THAN I CARE TO REMEMBER. I COME FROM A FAMILY WITH NO AVIATION BACKGROUND. LIFE, FAMILY AND WORK TOOK THEIR SHARE OF MY YEARS. IT WAS NOT UNTIL THE EARLY EIGHTIES THAT I COULD EXPLORE THE INTEREST I HAD IN FLYING. AFTER AROUND TEN HOURS IN CESSNA'S I BECAME BORED AND TRIED A FLIGHT IN A FLEXWING AND WAS HOOKED ! I BOUGHT A PEGASUS FLASH ONE WHICH WAS MY MODE OF TRANSPORT FOR AROUND FOURTEEN YEARS. THE FLASH TOOK ME THOUSANDS OF MILES IN ALL TYPES OF CONDITIONS. IT WAS GREAT SPORT TO SET OUT IN AN OLDER MACHINE WHEN THE LATEST FOUR STROKE MACHINES STAYED ON TERRA FIRMA BECAUSE IT WAS TOO ROUGH TO FLY. PUT A FEW NOSES OUT OF JOINT I THINK.

DURING THE NINETIES I MET MIKE HURN. A LIKEMINDED SOUL. WE SPENT SEVERAL YEARS FLYING ABOUT ON INTREPID ADVENTURES. IT SEEMED THE ONLY REASON WE WOULD NOT ATTEND A FLYIN WAS BECAUSE WE WERE AT ANOTHER. WE BOTH ORGANISED AN EVENT CALLED WINGSPAN IN 2003. THIS INVOLVED ONE HUNDRED MICROLIGHTS CROSSING THE CHANNEL AND RETURNING SAFELY. JUST BEFORE THIS I HAD FINALLY GOT AROUND TO DOING MY AFI COURSE AND BEGAN TRAINING WITH JAY AIRSPORTS AT HUNSDON. A COUPLE OF YEARS LATER I MET WITH DAVE COLLIER AT THE SAME TIME AS CHATTERIS AIRFIELD BECAME AVAILABLE FOR TRAINING. YEARS AGO I HAD REALISED THE POTENTIAL OF CHATTERIS AND KNEW IT WAS TIME TO MOVE ON.

2012

Wayne Kimberlin is now a qualified flying instructor . He will be basing himself at Melton Mowbray. Mike Mcloughlin has earned his RT examiner status and has already run many of his two day courses. They are proving popular. Do not attempt one without digesting as much as you can from his revision CD's though ! Pat Oakey has been happily flying G-JENK in between building his steam engine. G-CCNT is flying nicely for the NT group now, after a spell of difficult to remedy engine issues. The Wookie has been giving numerous flights in his spanking new Gyrocopter. And Dave Collier has nearly finished rebuilding his CT.I shall try and generate more flexwing training this year. The trend has been a definite bias towards fixed wing. Pat and I have been spending a fair bit of time at Boston airfield where Alistair is keen for us to start training . Just the teamaking facilities to finish and we are ready to go !

Heres to a safe and prosperous 2012 .

carry on france 2002