N512AR and N94AR both active from Boscombe Down today, working in the adjacent Porton Down ranges between 1000 and 1500ft QFE. N512AR aka TO1 (twin Otter 1 I guess) and N94AR as TO2 when communicating with Porton Range on the same freq as Boscombe APC 135.75. N512AR was up for about 2.5 hours before returning for lunch and being asked to report to the Supervisor for causing some problems with the local traffic patterns such as Old Sarum and Middle Wallop. N94AR continued on task, with G-PASF AS.355 Twin Squirrel which descended from 5700ft to 3500ft then 2500ft. One back end callsign heard was 'Sea Bass' (or CBAS).
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US acquisition of 21 MiG-29s in the news! US forced Moldova to sell MiG-29s Moscow: Moldova's former president on Monday said the US had pressed the former Soviet republic into selling its combat aircraft cheaply to Washington and dismissed charges that a former minister had defrauded the state. Petru Lucinschi said after testifying at the trial of former defence minister Valery Pasat that the $40-million sale of 21 fighter aircraft to the US in 1997 had been clinched to meet US concerns that the aircraft would have ended up in Iran. Pasat, now a senior manager at Russia's electricity giant Unified Energy Systems, is on trial on charges of abuse of power and fraud by selling the MiG-29s too cheaply, causing a loss of $55 million to the state. Lucinschi, in office when the deal was signed, said Moldova received an offer of $93 million for the aircraft, but came under pressure to sell to Washington. "We did receive an offer from a South Korean firm ready to pay $93 million,
DHC-6s N512AR and N94AR have flown the pond; N512AR has actually flown halfway round the world already! HHR-ABQ-GJT-GRB-BGR-Reykjavik-Mildenhall UK. And now they've landed at Boscombe Down, Wiltshire. Spooky! A friend of a friend says that they are going to be here for around 2 weeks doing 'terrain penetrating radar trials' over the Salisbury Plain Danger Areas. I wonder what this is all about?
I can't upload my video of the 4 fastmovers flying out of Groom due technical reasons or perhaps incompetence on my part. If anyone if really into analysing dots then let me know and I'll send you a DVD. But we really, really think it's a simple case of MiG-29 with F-16 chase plus Su-27 (ish) plus F-16 chase.
