Base Training at Châteaurou, France

Here's an Air France B747-400 (Jumbo) just touching down after doing a 1000ft circuit at Châteaurou (CHR) in central France. We shared the airfield for about 4 hours, nicely co-ordinating our movements so that one was always touching down while the other was downwind in the circuit.

The Air France pilots stopped for lunch and had their First Class meals outside in the lovely sunshine. We had a sandwich, pack of crisps and a piece of fruit in a goodie bag while circuit bashing...

Final Approach onto Runway 22 at CHR. You can just see the Air France Jumbo in the climb-out at the top of the photo. My Sim Partner is nicely flying the approach as witnessed by the PAPIs (the 4 lights to the left of the runway). They basically show 2 x red, and 2 x white lights when we are on the correct glidepath to the runway (3 degrees).

Slide Practice

Here's someone jumping down an A330 slide at Luton. Jumping down this one qualifies us for the slides on the A320 series as well as the higher A330 (which we all hope to progress to fly in due course).

Fire Fighting

Practice fire fighting at Luton Airport Fire Station. There is a specifically designed rig that uses gas flames to simulate aircraft fires. Here you can see one of us attempting to put out a fire in a toilet using a BCF fire extinguisher. The extinguishers are actually full of pressurised water, and the fireman puts out the fire by turning down the gas!