New owners???

[Ticketty Boo!]

There is a very large amount of transatlantic air traffic that caters for a lot less than 300-400 passengers as mentioned above. Have a search for the number of fuel stops at Shannon, Wick, Stornoway and Inverness as well as the two Icelandic airfields at Keflavik and Reykjavik. There are a phenomenal amount of new and serviced/ resprayed deliveries each week from Cessna, Gulfstream, Boeing and McDonnel Douglas (USA), Embraer and Pilatus(Brasil), Caanadair, Bombardier and De-Havalind (Canada) of shorter range aircraft that have to make enforced fuel stops along the way as well as Airbus (France) going the other way towards North and South America. The number of small business jet movements has been on the increase every year for the last 20 years.

Marketing would be everything though. Combine a long runway with aa servicing / repair / respray facility and you have a great asset.

Two uk examples - Southend and Bournemouth. Wee seaside towns full of grannies and shops selling pension book covers. Both site have massive aircraft servicing, repair and respray facilities - and queues to get in.

[Dunc]

Tru there are smaller aircraft coming across most of them do come Northabout Rekyjavik etc and yes Stornoway but have you checked the landing fee for something that size???doubt if it covers a firemans wage for a day.All the HIAL airports are subsidized except Inverness perhaps.Almost forgot all the airports you mentioned have Customs clearance facilities Machrihanish does,nt.I would hate to lose the airport and can only hope who ever takes it on (the base) does.nt want a slice of the HIAL available pie in which case we should be worried.
I beleve there were moves at Tiree only to use the staff when aircraft were due in..again not nice idea.

Dunc.

[Buzz Lightyear]

thanks dunc,

Good few points here.

If you take out the en route ATC issues there is no reason why the rest you mentioned cannot be put in. they are all infrastructure items, a bit of investment by whoever the new owner is could supply this, costly it may be but from revenue raised it could be offset, cranted this would indeed have to be a long term measure but you would have to put certain levels of service in.

I think you are incorrect on the fueling with passengers on board, i have been on aircraft before where they have re-fuelled, the crew told all passengers on board & no seat belts were to be fastned & the crew had to stand at specific positions while this was going on, i.e escape routes. On the fuel surely we are best placed to offer cheap fuel??? we have a POL depot on our doorstep with lines out to the base, this surely could be bought in on bulk & offered at a competitive rate??

I agree with tickety boo also, there is lots of smaller exec jets that fly, air taxis deliveries, cargo that would be possibilities.

i dont think wick, stornoway, inverness have customs clearance??? i think they will get clearance on your behalf, why have we seen aircraft in the past at machrihanish which have flown direct from the states, Norway for Vestas, southern ireland etc, how did they get on during the airshow wioth so many Irish visitors every second accent was irish that day?

Also you say you hope HIAL would not be involved with any future plans, why not? they are there, they have the services in place, operate the place just now, why change? Surely any private investment would offset the public purse..mine & you'rs money as you say, any injection would be welcomed & i am sure the executive would welcome it.

Why would a community buy out be so preferred & the right direction to take, who is going to pay for all the infrastructure out there? i know i certainly dont want to pay any more council tax than i am currently paying.

What would the community do with it? Dig it up & build houses?

This has got all the making of a good debate, please lets keep it going & keep it in prespective.

[Dunc]

Well we used to have to get aircraft to clear customs at Kirkwall or Aberdeen when they withdrew them locally. Even Military stuff had to be cleared...perhaps its changed..

Dont joke about building houses on it thou...............

The NATO/POL fuel possible..not sure just how much NATO stuff is there now I heard a lot is commercial fuel movements.


Good debate thou till it goes way off track.

Cheers

Duncan

[Sweltered]

Wick airport certainly had customs cover at one time. The customes house at Wick has been closed fro several years now.

[Dunc]

Oh yes I know they had in fact there was a Campbeltown guy called Mc Lean in them.However they were withdrawn as you say.
Customs was a strange affair there were "Custom" areas. Excise area's and VAT Areas, which were all different depending on the Country. Everything on scheduled flight to the Faeroes had to be cleared but not to some other European Zonal area's.
There is actually a International list of Airports from which you have to clear UK Customs.
Back to the Airfield sale now.When I worked at Stansted in 1960's land which previously had been taken for the MOD for the USAF during the war had actually to be offerred back to the origional owners viz the fermers...I think the Law it came under was Chrichel Down Laws or something like that. Maybe it still applies yet??? again maybe it was just in England..possibly local farmers might find something there...

Dunc


Dunc

[Buzz Lightyear]

Would houses really get built on it? where would they go? what about the services? Is that the best option?

Surely if it was used for what it was built for would be the better option?

Would a community buy out be the best way forward?

or would it be handed back to the local fermers, can it be handed back to them?

By all accounts by the reading of the courier i would say the deal has been done.

[EMDEE]

We don't know the terms under which the land was originally acquired by the MOD. Were there any reversion rights or was it acquired as an open ended outright purchase? Presumably the latter, or MAM would possibly have problems now getting outright title to the land, unless they are closely enough associated with the MOD to step into their shoes as owners.

The area is a mixture of good agricultural land and peat bog. Would the peat bog be any good to the farmers? There are now conservation issues with peat bogs.

As far as a community buy out is concerned, I think it looks as if the process has gone too far for any community body to be formed to take this ahead.

[Buzz Lightyear]

emdee,

my mind seems to tell me that there was a body formed 3-4 years ago for this type of scenario....any body else help here????

[Dunc]

Yes I got the feeling it's all done and dusted..MAM are the preferred bidders so it's been offerred somewhere before..................
I notice when they bought the Radar station at Scatsta in Shetland after the Business Plan was a trip to the Fund providers and Shetland Enterprise ...
Maybe thats the way you do it today.
Reading my last post I seem to remember it was up to the landowners to approach the MOD under that Law before it was sold on the market.There again that was in England.

I'm too much a sceptic when I read those things.Too much "old boy's network" possibly. But maybe thats not fair.

Dunc