New record attempt

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tnowak
Posts: 530
Joined: Wed Jan 02, 2008 11:00 am

New record attempt

Post by tnowak » Fri Oct 17, 2008 7:56 am

Info from an aviator in South Africa:

Cape Town – London – Cape Town
Maximum weight:
1000kg
Time to beat:
4 days 10 hours 16 min.
Aircraft:
Osprey GP 4 ‘Homebuilt’
FEBRUARY 1939 03:35am: Gravesend Airfield (south east of London, UK) on the 5th February 1939, Alex Henshaw opened the throttle of his heavily laden Percival Mew Gull G-AEXF. His destination, Wingfield, (Cape Town, South Africa) then after a short 27 hour rest it was all the way back to Gravesend, arriving there to a hero‟s welcome at 13:51 on 9th February 1939. 4 Days, 10 hours and 16 minutes. Solo, London - Cape Town – London in an aircraft powered by a 200hp de Havilland Gipsy Six series II motor. This record still stands today, almost 70 years later! Awesome.

Charles „Chalkie‟ Stobbart plans to break this record, the flight will be made in an Osprey GP 4 „homebuilt‟. An aircraft which a friend, Tony van den Heuvel, built at his home in Johannesburg over a period of ten years. Stobbart is an Airbus A340 Captain with South African Airways with over 20000 flying hours and has done other long-range flights in light aircraft. Refer to summary at end of article. Stobbart plans to depart from Cape Town International Airport, which is slightly south of the original Wingfield airfield and proceed to Biggin Hill, which is also slightly south of the original Gravesend Airfield; then back to Cape Town. The plan is to do this flight in less than 4 days.

When? May 2009. To date, the fact that no successful attempt at the record has been made, attests to the magnitude of the feat, which was accomplished by the late Sir Alex Henshaw all those years ago, in February of 1939. May 2009 Stobbart will fly the GP 4 from Cape Town to London and back with 2 fuel stops for the route northbound and again southbound. In 1939 logistics and the range of the Mew Gull called for 4 fuel stops for the record setting flight. Using the speed of the Mew Gull, Henshaw still managed to complete the return flight in the record time referred to above: An absolutely amazing feat of skill, courage and endurance.

Changes in aviation in the 20th century have been rapid. From the Wright brothers‟ fledgling flight in 1903, through Charles Lindbergh‟s crossing of the Atlantic in 1927, through the 2005 Global Flyer‟s solo circumnavigation of the globe. Giant strides have been made in aviation; the „next frontier‟ sub-orbital space flight has already been proved as feasible. As with the Wright Flyer, SpaceShipOne was built by a group of amateurs, without government funding and soon SpaceShipTwo will start commercial operations taking passengers on sub-orbital flights into space.

iancallier
Posts: 45
Joined: Mon Feb 04, 2008 7:27 pm
Location: hampshire

Post by iancallier » Fri Oct 17, 2008 11:05 am

Can we use the same rules - NO GPS involved
imc

PB
Posts: 60
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2008 7:56 pm

Post by PB » Fri Oct 17, 2008 6:33 pm

Why no GPS? The rules are the same - MTOW under 1000KG. Simple. Get on with it.

Henshaw (for whom I have the highest admiration) used every trick in the 1930's book to make his record flight. I'm sure he would have used GPS had it been available then.

There is no reason seven decades later not to do the same. Records mark the progress of man and technology.

And remember, this is only a record attempt. No records broken yet. Many a slip, twixt cup and lip.

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