Aerobility Aurora review
We’re harking back to 2014 and this Aerobility Magazine article written by Brian Whittaker - see for yourself what an amazing trip he had and then head to our website to book a ticket for this year’s trip!
https://www.aerobilityaurora.com/
Aerobility Aurora Flight 2014
Fundraising can be fun… Seeing the Northern Lights makes an appearance on a lot of ‘bucket lists’, and this flight ticked that box in spectacular style!
Airline pilots flying in high latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere often experience the Aurora Borealis, the beautiful light show caused by charged particles on the solar wind being drawn around the Earth by our magnetic field, glowing as they collide with gas molecules in our high atmosphere.
A way to share this was found in chartering an airliner to go and see it for ourselves, and in selling tickets for the flight, provide a useful and very unusual fundraising source at the same time.
‘If a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well’ is a useful maxim, which our March Aurora flight followed with flair…
A British Airways Airbus A320 was selected as the perfect aircraft for the trip - available, the right size and seating plan, and coincidentally the aircraft flown by Aerobility Chairman Shona Bowman. Flying with her were volunteers Captain Martin Delany and Captain Ian Mills.
London Gatwick Hilton Hotel came up trumps, providing superb conference facilities, delicious meals and discounted rooms for those who wanted to stay, as the flight returned in the early hours.
Informative and entertaining pre-flight and in-flight talks from BBC’s The Sky at Night presenters, together with Neil Parker, Head of Technology and Deputy Director of the Royal Greenwich Observatory, were given an extra lift by Aerobility friend Jon Culshaw.
A mixture of 74 people, some with diverse disabilities, including 17 wheelchair users, and able bodied Aurora seekers made the trip, and enjoyed the almost 4 hour flight with enthusiastic and caring attention from volunteer cabin crew Michelle, Simone, Elspeth, Hugo and Lucy, who had all given up their days off to crew the flight.
Next, the journey to ATC waypoint GONUT (N61, W004.6) at the northern edge of UK airspace, half way between the Shetland and Faroe Islands. There we held east-west extended legs to allow passengers on both sides of the aircraft a tantalising view to the north…
Greg Noble sums up his experience…
“…I had an amazing day yesterday on the flight. We got to the Hilton hotel at Gatwick and met up with Mike, the BA pilots and some of the Aerobility team in a big meeting room. About 80 people all up including the guests, like me and my friends, the flight crew and pilots from BA who had given up their day off to do the flight for nothing.
We had a 60 minute lecture from Pete Lawrence from the Sky at Night about the Aurora and how it's created, followed by a 20 minute talk from Neil Parker from the Royal Greenwich Observatory. Then we had a quick chat from Paul Abel and Jim Al-Khalili too. The whole time this was being hosted by the impersonator chap, Jon Culshaw who was either being Patrick Moore, Brian Cox or other famous folk like Winston Churchill. At about 6pm we got served a lovely 3 course meal in the room, whilst the Gatwick BA staff came around and checked us all in.
We then had to go across to the terminal, through security as normal and off to the gate where our plane was waiting. Nick, Lucy and I grabbed a glass of champagne while the less able folk were boarding. We all had free seating and almost everyone got a window seat. I had one all to myself. Take off was brill because the plane was so empty, climb rate was impressive! Won't get to experience that again!
We shot up to nearly 40,000 feet and headed off towards Aberdeen.
They served wine and nuts and after about 30 minutes Pete Lawrence came on the tannoy and said that we all had to take some black tape and cover all non-essential lights which would have ruined our night vision. We all helped to do this along with one of the pilots who was chatting to everyone (the Aerobility chairman, Shona Bowman). We then got a ‘10 minutes to blackout’ toilet warning, and were shortly plunged into total darkness. Rather odd on a flight!
After a few minutes of eye adjustment time, Pete came on and gave us a wonderful tour of the night sky from each side of the plane. We all stayed in our seats, but had one side on the way up and the other on the way back. The sky was amazing, it seemed like a white blanket of stars. Hundreds more than you could see from home. Not as good as the best I've seen in Arizona and outback Oz, but pretty spectacular. I took my binoculars and could clearly see Orion's nebula and Jupiter.
All the while everyone was aware of a growing hazy glow building up towards the front of the plane. After another 40 minutes or so, it was announced that we were approaching 61 degrees north, which is the limit of British airspace, and were going to start the orbits. With that, we banked sharply around and there it was…
Spectacular green curtains of shimmering light towering up into the sky, like a silk veil floating on a breeze.
Quite magnificent. We spent an hour going round and round so each side of the plane got to see it for 10 minutes at a time while Pete gave us constant commentary on what we were seeing and which stars we were looking at. It was superb, the aurora all the while growing and shrinking in intensity. All too soon we had to start heading home. Lights came back on and we had supper served, which was great. As was the tempranillo ;-)
Pete Lawrence said, as we were walking back to the hotel, that on a scale of 1 to 10, he'd give it a 4! I was amazed. He has done 250+ Aurora flights, so he must have a very good gauge, but I thought it was amazing. I can only start to imagine what an 8, 9 or 10 must look like! All in all a top day and well worth the money. It was thoroughly fantastic.”
Many thanks to Brian Whittaker for permission to reproduce elements of his report at: www.astropilot.info/aerobility/index.htm which has more information and passenger photographs. Brianwhittaker.com/www.AstroPilot.info
