Hinton in the Hedges - 1st June 2013

I arrived here on a beautiful evening with plenty of activity still going on. Around the field were an interesting mix of types including ZK-JQK a long way from home in New Zealand.

ZK-JQK is a Pacific Aerospace 750XL c/n 118, a large single engine aircraft - this example was built in 2005 and has operated with Hinton Sky Diving in the UK for several summers. The aircraft is powered by a 750HP Pratt&Whitney PT6A-34 turboprop. This aircraft is currently listed "for sale" on the Pacific Aerospace website with approx 3,300 flight hours.

Link to Pacific Aerospace website

Looking very smart was Swiss registered Cessna 177B Cardinal HB-CWC, this machine was built in 1972 with some 4,100 flight hours. This aircraft was recently imported into the UK and had actually been registered as G-ZION a week earlier on 23.5.13 but as can be seen had yet to adopted its new registration letters. Currently 29 Cardinals registered in the UK of which six are 177B versions like this machine.

Also dating from 1972 is this WSK Antonov An-2 HA-ANG c/n 1G132-53 - this aircraft has had this registration since delivered new 41 years ago. It first arrived in the UK in 1998. HA-ANG departed back to Hungary three days after this photo was taken.

 

Elblag - Poland 9.8.08

This was my first visit to Elblag airfield - Elblag is situated in the North East of Poland not far from the Baltic coast.

I arrived at 08.00 and was very lucky to find one person just opening up the main hanger - no problem with spotting once I'd introduced myself.



Outside the the hanger in excellent condition was An-2 SP-KBA - this aircraft is c/n 1G185-02 and was built in 1979.

The hanger itself contained 10 gliders and 13 aircraft including,



Two seat trainer SP-3523 a SZD 50-3 Puchacz built in 1989 and suspended from the ceiling to save hangar floor space.




SP-YBU is a Zenair CH 601 Zodiac first registered in 2004 - the "SP-Y....." registration block is used for "Special" aircraft mainly home & kit built aircraft and older aircraft without full type certificates.



SP-YUO is an example of the Polish built ultralight EOL-2 designed by Adam Kurbiel and built at Bielsko-Biala. This example has c/n EK-04-05 and was built in 1995 - it first flew as SP-PUO in 1995 ( the "SP-P...." series being used for prototypes / modified test aircraft etc ) before becoming SP-FUO in 1996. It was then re-registered to the newly introduce "SP-Y..........Special" category in 2003. Following the death of Mr Kurbiel in 2000 the design was accquired by a new company called 3xTrim in Poland and also to Remos in Germany.



Parked among the tall grass behind the hanger was An-2 SP-FDZ, the registration appears under the wing. This aircraft was previously used for "Loty Widokowe - Scene Flights" and is c/n 1G74-43, built back in 1967 and delivered to the Polish Air Force as "7443" - it became SP-FDZ in 1999.

Two other An-2 were on the far side of the airfield, SP-FDW painted yellow and SP-FMH painted red/white.

Two foreign registered aircraft were in the hangar here - D-EEUM TB-10 Tobago and F-JKDX Kappa KP-2U Sova.