RAF Scampton, Home of the Dambusters

Discussion in 'WW2 Battlefields Today' started by Capt Bill, Apr 8, 2010.

  1. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    If you look at the so called savings by shutting the place down....it's ridiculous that the base cannot be kept on a C&M basis as now.Apart from the Red Arrows an occasional aircraft drops in....local radar has been controlled from Waddington for many years.

    Probably it's a case of requisitioning airfields already sold off and in use commercially should there be an emergency.

    NATO might have an input to the final decision.

    RAF Scampton to be sold by 2022 - what now for the Red Arrows?
     
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2018
  2. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    I recollect I saw a saving figure of £3 million/year on the closure of Scampton. When I looked again the figure was withdrawn.However I see the official saving along the whole of the closure programme to be enacted has been quoted as £140 million up to 2030....peanuts compared to the defence budget.

    The savings includes selling off of Linton and Halton. Halton already has its some of its estate subject to a sell and lease back arrangement.

    Apparently the Red Arrows costs the defence budget £9 million/year,nothing so far uttered on its future.
     
  3. gmyles

    gmyles Senior Member

    The MOD don't do nostalgia.

    RAF Coltishall was the home of Douglas Bader and they shut it. RAF Neatishead was the longest continuously operated radar station in they closed it.

    RAF Leuchars was the most active fighter station during the cold war and could expect over 100,000 visitors during their open days. And they gave it to the Army.

    RAF Bawdesey was the home of radar and RAF Bentley Priory was where they controlled the B of B. Both closed. RAF Manston and RAF Finningley now both International Airports.

    I am sure there are many more ex RAF Stations with great histories. The MOD have to be pragmatic. There is no place for sentimentality.

    These closures do however give historians like us a reason to be nostalgic, so I fully expect some new books about RAF Scampton over the next few years.

    Gus
     
  4. Harry Ree

    Harry Ree Very Senior Member

    My concern is not related to nostalgia but as ACM Graydon has voiced.

    Red Arrows air base to be sold off

    Incidentally the aerial view of the airfield shows it as it was after the airfield was brought up to V Bomber standard in the mid 1950s.The V bomb weapon stores on the north side of the airfield which take the former of bunkers which incorporate earth backfill on the bunker tops with grass growing freely, appear to be not evident.They would be in line of the old short west/east short late1943 runway (which is shown and discarded) and could well have formed the apron for access to the bunkers.

    I had an informal tour of the airfield in 1996 and the large steel doors giving bunker access were welded up with a warning notice erected that the doors were unstable and dangerous.
     
  5. James S

    James S Very Senior Member

    Some places you automatically equate with the RAF , Scampton is one of them .
    Some of the areas must have a preservation order on them , Niggers grave for a start.
     

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