Rustenburg Flying Club Breakfast Fly-in 2016
By Garth Calitz
The Friendly people at Rustenburg Flying Club hosted a very successful breakfast fly in on Saturday 30th January. The wonderful flying weather and the idea of getting out and shaking of the January blues made for a great day with no less than forty-three visiting aircraft making their way to this beautiful airfield in the heart of Platinum country.
Rustenburg Airfield
Some of the Visiting Aircraft
Rustenburg Flying club has a long illustrious history; the club was established in 1943 and is based at the Rustenburg Municipal Airfield just to the West of the Central Business District nestled between the many Platinum mines in the area. Rustenburg Airfield (FARG) is located on the P20/2 Thabazimbi road at an elevation of 3700 feet and sports a 1225 meter tarred long runway (16/34) and ample parking for visiting aircraft on their tarred apron. Fuel is also available at very competitive rates.
Fuel Bay
Jabiru
Whisper TMG
Cessna 150
The Fly-in organised by Mouritz, Andre', Kobus and Phillip, presented an opportunity to many pilots to fly to great destination not too far from their home base and spend some quality time with their fellow aviators. A large contingent of aircraft flew in from Krugersdorp as always the guys from Krugersdorp really seem to enjoy attending fly-ins.
Dale de Klerk
Pilot's Post Founder Juri Keyter
Micro Aviation South Africa was particularly well represented with 10 aircraft made up of six Bantam B22J's and four Bat Hawks , seven of these aircraft arrived in a lose formation from Silver Creek Airfield near Buffelspoort Dam.
Bantams and Bat Hawks
MicroAviation Bat Hawk
Roel Jansen from Brits flying club arrived in his BMW powered weight shift trike, this particular trike sports a centrifugal clutch on the propeller which looks pretty odd on start-up as the motor starts turning but the prop remains stationary and only moves once power is applied. The Sonex belonging to Jan Potgieter generated a lot of attention amongst the visiting pilots.
Roel Jansen
Jan Potgieter
Superior Pilot Services and ATS students both made use of the opportunity to get a few cross country hours by flying to the fly-in having a mission and objective like a hearty breakfast, breaks the monotonous training schedule and exposes the student pilots to airfields they are not familiar with. Superior Pilot had a four attending aircraft three Cessna 172's and a Robinson 44. Thanks to Eduan and JB for giving me a ride to the event in the ATS Robinson R44.
Superior Pilot Services Crew
JB and Eduan
Phillip Botha from Swaaivlerk flight school based at Rustenburg offered short scenic flights over Rustenburg in his Robinson 44. He was pretty busy the whole morning with many people, some that had never flown before taking advantage of opportunity.
Phillip Botha
Vans RV 10
Atlas Angel
Skydive Rustenburg was extremely busy the whole day with load after load of skydivers going up in the beautiful Turbine Atlas Angel. Rustenburg is an ideal skydiving venue being outside the Johannesburg TMA the drop plane can climb to 16500 feet unhindered and that gives the skydivers 12000 feet to play with. Skydive Rustenburg's facility caters for sports skydiving and parachuting, offers Tandem Skydiving, First Jump Courses, Accelerated Freefall (AFF) Programs, Static Line Jumps, Student and Intermediary Freefall and Canopy Progression Programs, Canopy Control Courses and Canopy Formation Skydiving Coaching. Graham Field and his wife Danelle run the facility and safety is always a priority. Thanks Graham and Cornel for taking me along on a drop.
Skydive Rustenburg Skydivers boarding the Atlas Angel
Tandem Jump and View from 15,000 Feet
All in all an enjoyable day was had by all, Rustenburg Flying Club are planning on making this a monthly event and judging from the promises of support they received I can see it being a huge success.
Vans RV 12
Aerolight Xenon Gyro
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