Belgian aerodromes flooded?

[jan_olieslagers]

After the very heavy rain of the last weeks, what is the situation of Belgian aerodromes?

-) EBGB Grimbergen: some occasional flying today, after long silence; they have good drainage, thanks to neighbour Fritz coming along some 70 years ago.
-) EBGG Overboelare: VERY prone to flooding, and the nearby river Dender was much affected. I reckon they're closed for a good while yet... who is in the know?
-) EBHN Hoevenen: been closed for three weeks, and no indication of re-opening
-) EBAM Amougies: has a little river nearby (the Rhosnes, I think, often helpful in finding the field) but reputedly they have good drainage, too. Would they be flying?
-) ....?

[Devon Rex]

EBIS Isières: seems to be still opened since I saw some activity there yesterday...

[jan_olieslagers]

Thanks for info, DR. Are you a regular at EBIS? I often wondered about the place, as my (few) navigations passed close. I never managed to recognise it from the air, though. Mostly DPM, I guess, with a scant 200 metres of runway?

[Captain Remi]

Hello Jan
EBIS can be recognised from the air by following the motorway and river which both have a curve near the aerodrome. If I remember well, there is one brownish coloured hangar.
It is indeed a very tricky terrain, even with DPM for novices when the corn is at its maximum. Due to this, the strip becomes even shorter. Taking it diagonally always helps but still...
It also has a bit of a slope.

What will help you too to recognise from the air when you go to Amougies for instance is that EBIS has a green train wagon as a bar/ club house.
But it is one hell of a small airfield, hard to find indeed...

Greetz

[torchus]

Possibly slightly off-topic, but I wonder whether there exists some sort of regulation that says that grass strip aerodromes should be adapted (i.e. drainage such as on some soccer fields) to cope with extreme rainy conditions ? I wouldn't want to land my plane on a swampy grass strip. :s

Or are most grass strips just unmodified pieces of grassland ?

[DeltaWiskey]

A pic of overboelare 4 days ago. http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?fbid=1639201630634

[jan_olieslagers]

A pic of overboelare 4 days ago. http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?fbid=1639201630634

Not much use, unfortunately:

You must log in to see this page.

And no, I don't have an account there and don't wish to have one. Thanks just the same, though.

[jan_olieslagers]

Possibly slightly off-topic, but I wonder whether there exists some sort of regulation that says that grass strip aerodromes should be adapted (i.e. drainage such as on some soccer fields) to cope with extreme rainy conditions ? I wouldn't want to land my plane on a swampy grass strip. :s

Or are most grass strips just unmodified pieces of grassland ?

There are certain rules to be met by ANY aerodrome, grass or concrete or whatever - I once had to learn them for the exam, but that's a long time ago... Surely they do NOT say anything about drainage requirements. A few aerodromes have good drainage, most haven't.

But landing is, at the last instance, always "at captain's discretion" ! Remember the case at JFK, a couple of months ago, where tower would or could only assign an unsuitable runway to a landing plane, ISTR twas a B777 - the captain dryly said "sorry mate, if that's the situation, I am afraid I'll have to declare an emergency" which he duly did, and did land on the suitable runway.

To come back to our rural grass strips: almost all of them carry the PPR label, meaning one is supposed to call them before taking off, to make sure the runway is available. On top of that, there's always the signal square to positively forbid landing.

Funny enough, "swampy" is almost the exact word my buddy applied to the current state of EBHN...

[DeltaWiskey]

A pic of overboelare 4 days ago. http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?fbid=1639201630634

Not much use, unfortunately:

You must log in to see this page.

And no, I don't have an account there and don't wish to have one. Thanks just the same, though.

I hope this one works

[jan_olieslagers]

Yes, that works for me - and it shows exactly what I feared. I fervently hope the poor old DC4 is the only plane to get wet feet!

[Devon Rex]

Thanks for info, DR. Are you a regular at EBIS? I often wondered about the place, as my (few) navigations passed close. I never managed to recognise it from the air, though. Mostly DPM, I guess, with a scant 200 metres of runway?

Well, not a regular, but I live just next to Isières, so I pass by from time to time. I don't think the rwy in EBIS is 200m in length, more like 125-150m....it's indeed very small and, as said above, easily recognizable for it's train-bar. And as you state, indeed mostly DPMs and few ULMs.

[jan_olieslagers]

Well, I was at EBAM Amougies today - I even took a little tour of the skies. The field was quite nice, some bad ploughing near the hangars though. The locals told me it could have served for a hydroplane base a week ago, must have looked much like the EBGG photo.

Driving home I paid a quick visit to EBGB - where touch-&-go's were aborted a few feet off the ground, to become "almost touch, then go" and landing pilots were requested to only use "the second section of the runway". Which sounds to me like "due care for the infrastructure". A lawn takes time to recover, and the upcoming winter will slow down recovery even more.


@Devon Rex: thank you!