Teesside Airport Movements Trip Reports

Bulldog Flight

By Chris Smith

I was going to have myself £140 worth of Aberdeen day trip on Wednesday just gone courtesy of Eastern Airways but worldwide pandemics had something to say about it, so I thought I would type up this throwback to May 2004 instead when my 16th birthday present was a ride in then-resident Scottish Aviation Bulldog T1 G-CBBT/XX695.

My memory of it at this point is a little hazy; my birthday fell on the Thursday but the flight was on a weekend and I'm thinking it was a Saturday rather than a Sunday - I'm guessing the 1st rather than the 8th because I notice we took a bad weather diversion from Newcastle on the 8th in the form of Excel Airways 737-800 G-XLAA and chances are if the weather was too poor for airliners at Newcastle, then it wouldn't be sufficiently better just 40 miles south for GA flying, even if the Excel was a good few hours afterwards. Whatsmore, a surprise birthday present would almost certainly take place before not after the birthday! So I'm thinking this took place on the 1st May 2004.

The day started with me concluding my paper round with breakfast and an episode of Only Fools and Horses at my Gran's house when the pilot - Lorry "Lol" Stephenson - who lived in our village and was a friend of the family, came to my Gran's front door, and when my Gran answered having seen me through the window he declared in a now obviously fake tone "I'm here to buy some leeks" (my Gran was secretary of one of the two village leek clubs). My suspicions were raised when she shut the door behind her to have a conversation regarding what must have been details of the flight out on the porch. I didn't know Lol quite as well as the rest of my family at that point in time but I knew he flew GA and my mind started to wonder...

Later that day, I was in the car with my Dad, his partner and my sister and before we even got to Morton Park - where we could just as easily turned left to Morrisons, B&Q, Curry's or Homebase etc I knew very well that we were about to turn right towards the airport - if I recall correctly I think my suspicions were further raised by the fact that a couple of cars in front or behind was my Grandparents heading the same way. When we made that right turn I was satisified all of the evidence thus far confirmed I was going flying in my first ever light aircraft, but on the other hand being from a working class family I didn't consider myself worthy of GA flying which I perceived to be both expensive and extravagant. Yet when we took the first exit off the airport roundabout down towards the hangars there were no other possibilities so I declared the bag was out of the cat and my Dad just gave a knowing "Mmm".

This was my first venture down to the GA areas of the airport - I guess I was always subconciously aware of these 'behind the scenes' areas from when my Dad used to take me to the 23 layby from which they were visible but it was like I'd only been taking an interest in half of an airport before now and I really remember having my eyes opened to this whole other side of the place.

We arrived at the Aero Club building, then occupied by Cleveland Flying School, where we went to the Café, probably still called Wings Bar at that time, which was booming with families many of whom like me where there for pleasure flights. My Grandparents were there as were my Auntie and Uncle too. We waited about 45 minutes for Lol to return from a previous flight...when he did his first words were, "Have you ever taken the wrong guy flying?!". We thought he was joking at first because that is his sense of humour...then he went to a couple on the next table and started apologising to the bloke!!! He'd assumed this other guy was his passenger and proclaimed something to the effect of "right, shall we get going then!", naturally the guy thinking he'd won the lottery accepted...!

So myself and Lol headed out towards the Hangar 3 West apron and being just 16 I was a little bit ignorant as to the variety of GA available, I couldn't see past C152s and PA28s...! So when we arrived at this Bulldog thing I remember feeling a bit hard done by!!!!! Little did I know it would go on to become my favourite type of puddle jumper, and that whilst my above mentioned perception of GA flying as expensive and extravagant was largely incorrect - in the case of the Bulldog as an advance trainer with aerobatic capability it was probably a fair assessment! Again due to my ignorance and despite displaying obvious military markings, the military heritage of the aircraft did not register at the time. The aircraft belonged to CM Aviation Ltd of Wynyard, Billingham and registered as G-CBBT, marked as XX695 and coded "3". I assume CM must have stood for Craig McLeod hence the Cleveland Flying School connection. The aircraft would also be based at Fishburn later under the same ownership, and would return to DTV for a second stint in Hangar 3 West with a refreshed paint job and re-coded "C" on the port side and "M" on the starboard.

My memory of the flight itself is a bit patchy; I remember being particularly impressed by the engine starter button rather than the traditional key. We were on 05 and the flight lasted 30 minutes. My headset was u/s so we had to yell at each other for the duration of the flight!!! The weather was light cloud but mostly clear and there was a bit of wind - enough that I wasn't allowed to take the controls during the flight unfortunately. I may have been offered the chance to postpone until a more favourable day but in my excitement and impatience I declined. All of this is leaning me more towards the 8th as the date of the flight! I recall on our way back in Lol advised that we would have to land at a higher speed than normal as a Spanair mad dog was right up our arse. Being in the right hand seat and approaching from the North I hadn't seen the airport nor had I noticed our descent so when we made a sharp left onto a very short final I'll never forget the sensation of the 05 threshold appearing out of nowhere. The Spanair was rolling out as we were parking back at Hangar 3 West and I was hoping that writing this report might cop me a new airframe but looking at the Teesside Air Letter for May 04 even if I knew the correct date there are too many candidates...EC-FTS/FXA/FXY/GVI. I can't remember much about other aircraft present on the day other than the CFS 152 fleet all painted the same - BIXH/BJVT/BKWY/BMJC, and I seem to recall the orange scheme of G-ATRM too.

Back at the Wings Bar, I recall overhearing my Dad asking Lol how much he owed him, his response being, "Just call it 50 quid for fuel".

It was an amazing experience, a great day, and without question a fantastic birthday present. My research suggests we ended the visit by going for a joint birthday meal as my Grandad's was two days before mine, possibly just down the road to the Old Farmhouse.

An absolute priviledge to have flown in a Bulldog T1 which I didn't fully appreciate at the time but certainly do nowadays! When I took up flying lessons with Durham Tees Flight Training, the same Bulldog whilst not part of their fleet was available to hire and it was considerably more expensive per hour than the rest of the fleet!