RAF Upper Heyford (EGUA) 1955-1962

[Al]

Ken (Connieguy) and myself first started this base several years ago, not even sure why, then put it down to do other sceneries. After working on our recent RAF Burtonwood release and having used traffic from Heyford to visit Burtonwood (B36s and B47s) we decided we should finish it up and release it. I also have a direct connection to this USAF base in England as my father was stationed there from 66-69 were I spent my 5th through 7th grade years taking in the sites of England and I’m sure not appreciating it as much as I should have.

While this airbase is a little outside the Calclassic environment, we did throw in some improbable MATS traffic here and there to justify it. I lived there when the RF-101 Voodoo’s were stationed there and were being replaced with RF-4 Phantoms as I was leaving so it was interesting to go back to the CalClassic years and recreate the traffic of that era. Ken has even built the housing area where I lived those 3 years. My school was across the street from the flight line, I could hear the Jets all during the day.

Here are a few shots from the 1955 Traffic. RAF Upper Heyford was a SAC Reflex base so there were not permanent flying squadrons; they rotated in from the states, primarily B-47s Squadrons doing 90-day rotations

Alert Pad


In 1954 RB-36s from the 5th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing arrived in England for the first time and spent June and July at Heyford. They were from Travis AFB which I recently released. We chose to include them in the 55 traffic for variety.




Occasional visits by the huge B-52 commenced at the end of 1960 and became more and more frequent over the next five years.  Here are some shots from the 1962 Traffic.


Meanwhile, following nuclear tests behind the 'Iron Curtain' in the summer of 1962, a detachment of top secret U-2 strategic reconnaissance aircraft operated from Upper Heyford in August to carry out air sampling and analysis at very high altitudes in order to determine the characteristics of latest Soviet weapons.

Where they kept them at Heyford I have no idea so took my best stab at finding them a hiding spot. There are two of them present in this scenery

A third new aircraft type was the B-58 Hustler, was occasionally seen.




RAF Upper Heyford is nearing completion, mostly finalizing the ai traffic and documentation left to do.

Al

[Deleted]

Thank you to both for being one of the very few remaining to take again and again the initiative to create further sceneries! And hopefully there are still a few which duly appreciate your efforts and skill.

Bernard

[connieguy]

Thank you very much, Bernard. It is always good to have our efforts appreciated. I will just add a little to Al's excellent post. As with Burtonwood there will be a UK photographic scenery supplied and one for default FS9, with the latter as the default choice. I give below an overhead of the photographic version. It is much more successful here than at Burtonwood, because whereas the landscape at Burtonwood has changed out of all recognition Heyford only closed in the early 1990s and survives virtually intact. Even so, those who look at Google Earth will see that a certain amount of new housing has been built since the UK photographic scenery was done. The bungalows mentioned by Al can be seen at bottom centre. After this release we intend turning our attention to what I have always thought one of the great lacunae of the CC world.
Ken

[wriric]

Many thanks for this one.

As a young air cadet I spent a wonderful week attached to the Oxford University Air Squadron at RAF Bicester in the summer of 1965 - spent most of our time flying practice GCA approaches in Chipmunks at Heyford, mixing it with the F1-11's which were the based aircraft then - interesting !

Richard.

[Al]

Thanks for the comments guys. Wriric I am assuming you meant 1975 as the F-111s didn’t get to Heyford until the early 70s. RF-101s arrived in late 65/early 66 when France ask USAF NATO forces to leave. My father was an Air Traffic Controller and RAPCON controller I believe starting in Mid 66. I believe Ken meant the 1990s above and I am very happy Ken agreed to help recreate this memorable station I got to live at. Dan French’s Castle AFB Is another place I spent 63-65 at. As Ken hinted, more to come.

[chris_c]

This looks awesome, Thank You in advance!

Chris

[nmlw]

Your efforts take a lot of time and attention to detail. Very nicely done.

[jwh]

Another wonderful and very welcome creation. Kudos to all involved.

John

[ianelliot]

Do like these airfields, great work guy's. Ive got a half finished 1950's RAF Fairford lurking somewhere, with a basic traffic file for JY B47's.
use's MAIW objects but easily changed. Let me know if you want to have a play

[Al]

Hi Ian, would definitely like to see your Fairfield creation. I seemed to have D.Morgan's version installed but never did anything with it and don't know why. Just looked and buildings are there but no runway or taxi's. This is one of the bases I had planned a while back to do when I was creating B47s bases everywhere, just never got to it. Given I have most of your other non WWII sceneries I am sure I would like this one. If you have period photos you were working off I would like those as well.

I will send you a PM with email address.

[connieguy]

Now released on Flightsim and Avsim.

www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?do=copyright&fid=215578

library.avsim.net/download.php?DLID=226698

[Al]

Seems I forgot to include in the installation instructions that you will need Dan French's latest library of Military buildings and Hangars volume 4 which you can find at flightsim.com. Just copy the below into Flighsim.com search - file name.
dlf_lib_militaryhangarsbuildings_v4_fs9.zip

If you installed my Travis or Bunker Hill sceneries you will have already had this, or at least should have.

This affects the 4 Nose Hangars in the Heyford scenery. They were one of the last things added so sorry about that.

Thanks to John Hewson for pointing this out.

Al