Opendoor at Beauvechain Airbase

 

Text : Serge Van Heertum - Pictures : Serge Van Heertum, Eddy Devroey & Kurt Vanden Noorgate © S.B.A.P.

 

  A part of the static display

 

The Open Door programmed by the Belgian Air Component authorities was a real success, with many visitors coming to the base during these two days as to celebrate the 40 years and 300.000 flight hours of the SIAI MARCHETTI SF.260 fleet.

The weather was perfect and the participation of many training aircraft from different nations was certainly one of the keys of this success.

 

 

July, 21 is the Belgian National Day and all the participating airplanes of the Brussels 'Défilé' flew also over Beauvechain to commemorate these events.

Go to the flight report regarding the National Day  : click on the above picture

 

To ST40

  

To ST30

 

One of the highlights was certainly the official presentation of the SF.260 ST30 especialy painted for the occasion.

 

   

To ST11

    

 

Another remarkable SF.260 was present in the static display... the ST11 from the Golden Falcon Museum of Beauvechain. This aircraft crashed at Goetsenhoven on April 7, 1992. The aircraft was put in storage before rejoining the Beauvechain collection. For this occasion, the ST11 was completely restored and displayed in a camouflage colour scheme. You will find a pictorial overview of this plane and some restorations phases in our Marchetti pages.

 

This page will give you an overview of the static display and the arrival of the aircraft, together with the National Day flypast and also some of the flying demontrations.

The SBAP Team would like to thank the Beauvechain airbase personnel and particularly the Base Commander, Colonel Aviator Patrice Laurent, for their help and obligingness during the making of our Marchetti book and also for their help on our Open Door reports.

We are also grateful to the COMOPSAIR/IPR team for all they did to help us, particularly giving us the opportunity for the air to air pictures, you can watch in the National Day report.

It was a great and realy appreciated collaboration !

 

Arrivals and Static display

 

The venerable Fouga MT35 F-140G and F-16A a fighter story in Belgium
   
Alouette II and Agusta A 109BA Piper Seminole from BAFA school
   
YAK 52 coming from Temploux Airfield "Cloety" and his splendid Extra 300
   
Grob G 120A-F the basic training in France performed in the ECATS French Grob G 120A-F crew
   
Aerospatial Epsilon from Cognac The grey livery of Epsilon
   
The French team from Grob and Epsilon Pilatus PC-9 from KLU with 75.000 flt hrs marking
   
Short Tucano from the RAF with aniversary markings of the 1FTS Very British...isn't it?
   
Siai Marchetti SF.260EM from Italian Air Force Italian Marchetti crew
   
Facination... a real good name for this machine registred in the ULM category. Modern design for this ULM originated from Czech Republic
   
ALCA L-159T1 from 212lt Aermacchi MB-339A
   
Aerospatial SA341F Gazelle from 1/2 EHLE based at Dax Antonov AN-26 from 59. "Szentgyörgyi Deszö" Harcászati Repülö Bázis
   
Aero L-39ZO from the Hungarian Air Force MH 59. Sz.D. R unit The aircraft is painted in a shark design, realy original
   
  Aero L-39ZA from 222tl wearing a special paint for the 40 years of L-39 design  

 

Special guests : Swiss Air Force PC-21

 

Not a long time ago, before the Beauvechain Open Door, the Belgian SF.260's from the 5th Squadron went to Switzerland for a squadron exchange. The Sion based PC-21 flew some exercices in the mountains in collaboration with Belgian pilots and their "Marchetti". In return, the Swiss Air Force PC-21 of the JEPAS (Jetpiloten- Ausbildungssystem) where invited to come to Belgium for the Open Door. This great modern training aircraft was certainly one of the hightlights of the static display.

 

The PC-21 Courtesy

 

Features
The PC-21 is a single engine, low-wing swept monoplane with a stepped tandem cockpit. The primary structure is aluminium and elements of the secondary structure are made of composite material. The performance, handling and wing loading place the PC-21 in a class beyond the reach of any other turboprop training aircraft. Digital avionics, based on powerful open architecture computers, maximize the value extracted from each training sortie. The aircraft is optimised for the following roles:
  • Basic Flying Training
  • Advanced Flying Training
  • Mission System Management Training in the Fighter Lead-in Role

    •  

    Cutaway view of the PC-21 (Pilatus)
     

    Cockpit & Avionics
    Systems integration is at the core of the PC-21 cockpit design philosophy. There are three 6x8 inch AMLCD main displays and two AMLCK standby displays in each cockpit. All displays are NVG compatible. The front cockpit has a Head Up Display (HUD) and the rear cockpit is fitted with an HUD repeater. The Primary Flight Display provides information such as speed, altitude, attitude, turn and slip and navigation information. The multi-function displays (MFD) provide a wide variety of page formats. These can include master systems pages, engine instrumentation and crew alerting functions, checklists, moving map, simulated stores management and tactical displays including synthetic radar. Inputs to the system are made via the MFD soft keys, the up-front control panel, and the Hands On Throttle and Stick.

     

    Modern glass cockpit The HB-HZC from pilatus at Beauvecahin (courtesy Jozef Vandervorst)

     

    The Belgian team at Sion One of the opendoor highlight
       
    Equiped like a jet Impressive flying machine
       
      A Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A-68B as engine

    A little bit humor...

    Drawing on the Italian Air Force SF.260 Something lost ?...      (E. Devroey)
       
    The "T.E.D"...Tcholle Express Delivery !

    National Day flypast (Eddy Devroey)

    Smoke pass by 6 Alpha Jet 1B (E. Devroey)
       
    Siai Marchetti SF.260 box (E. Devroey) F-16AM's (E Devroey)
       
    Fly pass from the F-16AM and F-16BM from Kleine Brogel and Florennes (K. Vanden Nootgate) & (E. Devroey)
       
    Westland Seaking Mk 48 (E. Devroey) Agusta A109BA bringing the bad weather from Brussels (E. Devroey)
       
    C-130H Hercules from Melsbroek Airbase (E. Devroey) Falcon DA20E from 21 squadron (E. Devroey)
       
    Seaking at landing in Beauvechain (E. Devroey) A last pass of the 7 Alpha Jet before the break (E. Devroey)

    Flying demonstrations

    Fouga Super Magister CM 170, a civil one piloted by Robert Fage
    (K. Vanden Nootgate)    		 A new French Air Force team "la patrouille camomille" from Avord
    (K. Vanden Nootgate)
       
    Cartouche doré and their Epsilon aircraft (K. Vanden Nootgate) A demo of the Pilatus company PC-21, realy impresive in flight !
    (K. Vanden Nootgate)
       
       
       
    The home based "Hardship Red" team and their SF.260's
       
    The final of the opendoor : "Mitch" from 349 squadron and his F-16AM

     

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