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The DHC-1 Chipmunk remains in limited service with the British AAC and RAF in mark_in_gs si'!7ilar to this civilianised example, 45 years after the prototype's first flight.
From The Cockpit – DHC Chipmunk
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De Havilland Canada’s Chipmunk
Ask a dozen fliers “What does flying mean to you?”, and you will get a dozen answers. Ask “What is ‘real’ flying?” and the answers will be the same – at the grassroots level the satisfaction from flying is instinctive and unsurmountable. As tudent pilot with jumbos in his eyes will return years later to search for it; a jet jock will as well.
The name de Havilland remains synonymous with flying machines, which to this day provide the flier with experiences and sensations which are the satisfiers of mankind’s basic desire to fly. These experiences are perhaps best provided by the Moth series of aeroplanes. Although De Havilland Canada DHC enclosed the cockpit, their first aeroplane design, the DHC-1 Chipmunk retained the essential qualities of the parent range of aeroplanes ‘across the pond’, endearing itself to all its pilots as a ‘real’ flying machine. The Chipmunk became a popular training aircraft and has been such for more than four decades.
Just as the Chipmunk is a grassroots flying machine, the appropriate experience is best obtained flying from a grass field. Although such airfields are written into the CAO, to my knowledge it has been quite a while since any all-over grass field operation has been seen in Australia. In England one may experience a time warp by flying from the all-over grass airfield of Middle Wallop, one of Britain’s oldest airfields. It is presently the home of the British Army Air Corps (AAC), and was the birthplace of British military aviation under the banner of the Royal Flying Corps.
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