Biggin Hill to Solent Airport on a cold and snowy winters day

The start of 2019 in the south east of the UK has been a real mixed bag of weather and flying conditions. We’ve had clear skies, overcast cloud, rain, gusting wind and now snow!!

I have been trying for a while now to get to Kemble with fellow pilot Graham with our last attempt 1 month prior being cancelled due to low cloud covering Headcorn. Following the disappointment of not being able to go anywhere, we reserved the date – 2nd February for another attempt.

A couple of days before our planned flight the UK was hit by a couple of bouts of snow with the south east and Kent getting its fair share. I actually called Headcorn a day before the flight to find out how it had affected the airfield and if it was even worth starting with my flight planning. My suspicions were actually a lot worse that I had anticipated. Not only had the heavy snowfall made the entire airfield unusable, it had waterlogged the grass runway. On top of this the snowfall caused the River Beult (which runs parallel to the runway) to burst its banks and also flood the runway.

So with Headcorn a definite no-go but the weather forecast actually looking good for the 2nd February, I arranged with Graham for us to go back to my old club based at Biggin Hill where they have a nice long tarmac runway and plan the flight in their PA28 G-BUJO.

We both got to Biggin Hill early to finalise the plans and get our PPR. After visiting the Kemble airport website the webcam revealed a complete covering of snow and the airport information simply stated ‘Airfield Closed’. So we has to start thinking of a plan B.

Wherever we decided to go, the airfield needed to have a tarmac runway, so we pulled out the charts to look for possible options. Elstree was our first call, but were told on the phone that although they have a tarmac runway it was covered in ice. Wellesbourne was another option and all looked good but by now the time was getting on and we had yet to clean the plane and re-fuel, as well as plotting our route so, decided that was a little too far in the circumstances.

So we started looking towards the south coast and made our next call to Solent Airport as it is now known. This time it was much more encouraging as they not only had a nice long tarmac runway, it was clear of any snow or ice and the weather was good. They helpfully allowed us to book PPR over the phone so that was it, decision made.

With the route planned our next it was to the aircraft on the stand in the coldness of the outdoors. The PA28 was covered in snow so the first job was to brush all of that off and then de-ice it. Both the fuel and oil needed topping up all adding to the time.

As I am no longer a full flying member at Alouette I was not covered under the insurance to fly as pilot in command, so my job for the flight was as P2 (co-pilot) in charge of planning, navigation and the radio while Graham did the flying.

So, an hour and a half later than planned, we taxied out to the engine run up area to do our power checks, then onwards to runway 03 for departure. On approaching the holding point we informed ATC that we were ready for departure who then asked if we could accept an immediate take off. We were all ready to go and confirmed that we were ready for an immediate take off.

The only issue is that the holding point Charlie is still quite a distance to taxi for runway 03 and just before we were about to turn to line up on the runway ATC instructed us to cancel our take off. We acknowledged this and then followed instructions to taxi to the holding point J1 which is a shorter distance to the runway.

After waiting for an opposite direction inbound jet to touch down and vacate the runway we were then given our instructions to line up on runway 03 and cleared for take off, and we were on our way.

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Shortly after take off, I had the feeling that there was a minor issue with the aircraft transponder. The controller asked us to confirm the level we are climbing to and gave us a reporting point at the Kenley gliding site but also reminded us to squawk 7047 which is the conspicuity code used at Biggin Hill. We were already squawking that code and we confirmed this to the controller who didn’t mention anything further.

Our route took us on a westerly track keeping north of the controlled airspace around Gatwick and as we climbed away we could see the hills were all covered with a layer of snow. The gliding site at Kenley didn’t appear to be active but we gave it a wide berth anyway.

Just after passing Kenley we called Farnborough LARS West for a Basic Service, and it was then obvious that our transponder was not working at all as they were not picking up our Squawk code. On suggestion from the controller we tried to tune into the VOR/DME at Ockham to give them a bearing in order to identify us – that didn’t work either as it turned out the VOR/DME was also not working. So both were going to need reporting and looking at on our return. But the GPS was working as well as the Mk1 eyeball, map and compass so we carried on.

On approaching Guildford we made a left hand turn to on a south westerly track via Midhurst and Portsmouth where we changed frequency to Lee Radio as we approached the Solent. By now, there was no sign of any snow and the sky was blue and cloudless and the sun was shining.

Our approach took us out to the Isle of Wight and with not much traffic in the circuit routed to Cowes then making a right turn for a straight in approach. With a slight crosswind we touched down on runway 05, parked and shut down the aircraft and headed over to the main building to pay the landing fee and get some lunch in the newly opened cafe.

View the video on my YouTube channel: