Hi + Topic - Unusual Osprey sighting - UK - RAF Manston

Hello ATS

I'm essentially a long term lurker and have usually used ATS to get an insight into alternative views aside from what the MSM tells us regarding current affairs. I really wanted to create a thread today due to seeing an usual sight in my neck of the woods but couldn't do so due to my low post count. Maybe a mod can move this to another forum if they deem it worthy.

So...

Today (29/12/14) at approx 11.45 GMT there was an Osprey aircraft flying over the old disused RAF Manston (Kent International).

Now it strikes me as peculiar considering the airfield has been closed for a number of months and the previous owner did a fire sale to sell all of the infrastructure before a public consultation could be made (airfield vehicles, fire trucks, runway lights, backup generators, radars etc). If something were to fail and there be a crash there would be no ground support.

In all the time I've lived here (15+ years) I've never seen an Osprey.

I quickly managed to stick my phone out of the car window and get a video...(my friends wouldn't believe me until I showed them the video).



Can anyone tell if it is a US owned aircraft from the video?

Does anyone know what it was doing here?

Could it be one of the two based at RAF Mildenhall?

www.bbc.co.uk...

We have an old Runway behind my work, (longest in Europe) its owned by a car company now, but a small part is used as a runway,

i have had Apache gunships and Chinnocks fly over my work but they are not based there, maybe the Osprey was doing some surveillance work for possible landing sights in case of emergencies?

or Arial views for film or property development?

Hats off for the footage
Well done op .
( right where's my tin foil hat )
There's Been a lot of activity down the Humber region lately to with heavy aircraft .

When you say longest runway, are you refering to the one in north norfolk?a reply to: Phatdamage

a reply to: billyvonhelvete

NO, its in North Bedford, near Thurleigh, it famously had Concord land on it in the 70's (as some parts of the wing were build there) if you look on Google maps its a giant car park now, (i think it has almost 5 miles of tarmac)

Google Map

wikimapia.org...

a reply to: Loque76

Nice phone vid! We need more people like you OP!

No clue why it would be there.

Ahh right, i though you were talking about raf sculthorpe, it also has a very long runway, once used to land one of the sr71's. Do they keep up the runway near you in good working order?, as they do sculthorpes, its still used for training. Lately with the talk of the coldwar part 2!, ive noticed alot more military craft in the skies around norfolk. Most of the old base at sculthorpe has been sold, housing estates and a small industral park. Its makes me wonder whats going on around my area, as sculthorpe base was an important base in the cold war era, it was last used by usaf. Only time will tell!a reply to: Phatdamage

How rude of me!, forgot to say hello and welcome ya to the land of the loons!
All the best.
B. V. H a reply to: Loque76

a reply to: Loque76

It' probably a training flight by one of the V-22's stationed with the 7th Special Operations unit at Mildenhall. It's not that far away from Maston.

a reply to: Loque76

Great catch Loque76. I've never seen an Osprey over the U.K. And welcome to ats.

On the subject of car company's using ex RAF/USAFE runways I worked at Upper Heyford near Bicester some years ago. The runway was used to store cars used for test drives. We even had Police cars and police vans and some UN 4x4's. The word was if the MOD wanted it back we had 48 hours to clear out.

RAF Upper Heyford wiki

a reply to: Loque76

Israel and Japan have both expressed interest in buying V-22s, but currently they're all US owned.

It's a USAF CV-22 most likely from RAF Mildenhall. They're probably out doing some kind of training flight.

Special ops planes from Mildenhall have been known to use the also abandoned RAF Sculthorpe. If one breaks and they can't fly it back they'd probably just load up an MC-130 with equipment and personnel and fly over to the site. Maybe they'd even have some fun with it and airdrop everything and everyone in.

Thanks everyone for all of the response. You've answered all of my questions and more.

It's a shame the airport closed really. In the past 15 years I've seen so many different aircraft: Typhoons, Tornados, the good old red arrows, but my favourite was always when the Battle of Britain flight came in. Lancaster bombers were the heavy ordinance carriers of WW2 for Britain but it seemed funny how they were always dwarfed parked next to a 747

I was once even fortunate to see a Spitfire and Hurricane doing dogfighting manoeuvres for a number of veterans who were having an anniversary.

I'm still not sure what's puts those good chills up my spine most though; the deep growl of a Spitfires Merlin engine or the sheer power of a typhoon going full after burner...

a reply to: Loque76

You should hear those old engines from on board. I flew around Oahu on a B-25, and about crapped my pants listening to the coughing and sputtering on the ground.

Further to yesterdays sighting there was another unusual incident today...

At approx 04:00GMT 30/12/14 I was awoken by a low flying jet engined aircraft. I didn't see it but it definitely wasn't a fighter aircraft and sounded something more like a small commercial/private jet.

Now the really weird part is that the wind was blowing in my direction and I heard the noise of the engines powering down as if it had landed (I've heard this sound hundreds of times in the past and wouldn't mistake it). It was dark at 04:00am and there are no longer any runway lights (as they were sold) and there is no ground control.

The Osprey in the video above was flying directly above the runway as I was filming it. Could it have been surveying/checking the runway for something to land on it?

Rendition flights???

The UK is just an aircraft carier for the USA with about a hundred military bases over it and the US does not need to ask any of us before it does anything.

They are also fooling radar by flying black helicopters at night, low to the ground that are so close togather that they are almost touching each other and this is something i saw for myself about ten years ago.

We don't want or need the US militay bases here and no politician dare say hardly a word about it so what going on

a reply to: Loque76

Is that air field maintained in any way?

Even if the US or MoD wanted to land something there they would still need some kind of support infrastructure for re-fueling, maintenance, supplies, ect. for what ever landed there.
Possibly they are feeling it out first for future utilization?

Can you access the air field by car or on foot? If you can then I doubt anything nefarious is going on there. If things like guards, new fences, patrols, or surveillance cameras start popping up then those would possibly indicate that something was afoot.

If the airstrip is being used for potential rendition flight/s then those security measures above may be temporary or fleeting and time could be of the essence in reconnoitering the airfield if you really want to find out for yourself.

If you can access the airfield look for evidence of tire tracks, fresh rubber on the runway, anything that might indicate someone was there and had made use of the air field recently.

a reply to: Loque76

Hi there OP,

well last time we had UK bases being used for rendition flights they utilised a lot more airfileds than was reported when the story broke.
I myself saw one of the planes (matching tail-numbers) that was used , whilst i was working up at Waddington in Lincolnshire. and one of my old work colleagues even saw them land ( for 30 mins only ) at an old air field up in Scotland,
so it may be possible that it is being used for this purpose.......

However that being said it is far more likely to be training of Spec Ops out of a nearby base, and considering what is happening at various places around the world at the moment it is not surprising. I think we will see a lot of `retrivals` of persons from situations over the next year or so.

snoopyuk