Low Flying

[Jetson]

Ta Casper!
its the perfect site to be interested in Jet aircraft in Northern Ireland and must bag myself an ace camera one of these days.
Is it tricky to mention jet location sightings in location and time? you could feel and hear the tornado come from miles away amazing speed.

[CanonJohns40d]

Hi Jetson and welcome as Casper said.

I'm not sure what you meant by "tricky to mention" but if it helps until his recent transfer Lossie 03 was contacting me directly to advise of Tornado arrivals and departures. He was happy for me to pass this on so that those interested could get photographs. I was lucky enough to be invited onto Aldergrove at the former RAF side; now JHC Aldergrove, to photograph the jets on the ground and meet the crew.  Hope this helps.

John

[Jetson]

Hi CanonJohns40D
You were pretty lucky to see the base at JHC Aldergrove!  I meant by tricky because there must be areas where jets cant fly in NI due to trivial complaints? Personally I would like to see them anywhere in NI !  I live in west tyrone outside Omagh and its very rare to see a RAF jet at all apart the odd helo from enniskillen and light planes from carrickmore flying school and the tornado flew pretty low and fast(very cool) then flew high into sky avoiding big towns would like to see a regular occurrence over here!! plenty of room for training!!
My area seems to be directly in the flight path of commercial airliners as well as low level planes.
Pass my thanks to Lossie 03 for the low level flyby

P.S The RAF tucanos a few months ago flew directly over me as well

Anyway this is a great site to start myself off on plane spotting and learning to use a professional camera!!

Good night!

[biggles]

Hi jetson there are various low level heights which start at 500ft and down to 100ft depending on what and where the aircraft are doing,
I have read items on speed cams mounted in trees to catch low flying and farmers painting messages on barn roofs for the pilots to read.
During gulf conflict in 1991 tornados were low level at 50ft and I think at one point there was a height of 30ft flown at fast speed.
It's always good to get the sight smell& sound of a fast jet into the lungs.
Welcome to the forum.

Biggles

[AERTANK]

I could be wrong but I believe there are only two areas in the UK that are set up for very low flying, Northern Scotland and Parts of Wales! I believe a sort of low flying licence is required for ultra low flying in the UK with varying grades?? I can understand the general publics issues with low flying aircraft, and the needs of farmers during sensitive times like lambing season are taken into consideration as to when and where low flying training takes place, much in the same way the old Nato "Reforger" Ops were conducted in the Autumn after harvest time! I love to see the french Air Force over here doing some low flying but then again they do have Chad and Djibouti to practise in!


AERTANK

[Causeway74]

More info on the LFAs here:
http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/AboutDefence/WhatWeDo/AirSafetyandAviation/LowFlying/LFAs/

[Jetson]

Hey evening all ,seems this site is often used way to go !thanks for the link ringo , biggles there was a famous picture somewhere that in wales that said piss off biggles. cant mind where i found it , just before I forget  thanks Casper for moving this discussion. Yeah low flying... been reading up on where low flying jets regularly fly in the UK, am interested in getting myself a camera and getting some awesome shots , I remember when I was living in dumfries and galloway like about 5 years ago they always arrived on the dot for training some hawks, tornadoes and F15s when I was watching them the american jets seem to fly hard and rough (good to see though) and british ones flew gracefully with more skill! and only one day where I saw 2 tornadoes on a dog fight practice right above me!! no digital camera then or anything to take shots. what I would like is times and areas of regular occurrence and NI should open the mournes and sperrins  and empty  coast for fast jet practice its perfect for it now that no army choppers are in regular flight in NI.
but anyway I think the minimum height is 250 ft for low flying when I saw Lossie 03 go by it was pretty much that height! totally amazing. Just makes me wonder why the jet went out west was he doing a loop of NI!

Just reading about a bit of plane spotting areas around aldergrove seems you cant get to close to the base is it possible to see future RAF jets take off and land in full view? Its all we want isn't it?

Jetson