Teddfield Sling Boerie and Blosoms Camping Fly-In
- Garth Calitz
- 6 hours ago
- 3 min read
By Garth Calitz
We planned to head to Tedderfield on Friday afternoon, set up camp, and spend the day snapping photos of everyone arriving for the first camping fly-in at the famous Sling Aircraft homebase. Unfortunately, the weather had a different idea. Friday afternoon got hit with those classic highveld thunderstorms that went on all night, putting a damper on our camping plans.
The updated itinerary had us heading to Tedderfield on Saturday morning, while closely monitoring the somewhat cloudy weather, which thankfully did not worsen. Upon arrival, we were welcomed by warm-hearted individuals, a steaming cup of coffee, and a tasty boerewors roll at the Sling clubhouse. At that point, the only pilots who had dared to fly in the conditions were a group of trikes, including the CAA's own Neil de Lange. I sometimes question the sanity of trike pilots for flying in these open aircraft in the early morning hours, regardless of the cold, then I recall that's exactly how my aviation journey began.
JJ le Grange organised a cool activity for some young aviation fans, inviting them to join a navigation exercise led by none other than Iaan and Tarryn Myburgh, who just came back from the World Navigation Championships silverware in hand. Pilots were asked to volunteer their time and aircraft for this event. The response was awesome, but bad weather and engine troubles kept most of them stuck at their home bases. Out of the 15 planes promised, only six made it to Tedderfield, but in true aviator fashion, this little hiccup didn't ruin the plans.
The morning kicked off with Megan Stevenson from Infinite Aviation giving a fun intro to the world of navigation. She took the kids on a journey from the old-school days of maps and stopwatches to today's high-tech magenta line navigation. Megan also shared some cool insights on how satellites help pinpoint locations for safe and accurate flying.
Tarryn hopped up to the podium and chatted with the kids about what competition rally flying is all about, both locally and on the international stage. Tarryn then laid out the day's task: the kids got an envelope with "papers," as they're known in the rally scene. They needed to map out a route and then fly it with one of the pilots. While in the air, they had to spot and identify photos of landmarks along the way, just like in a real rally flying competition.
After completing the plotting, it was time to take to the skies. Some pilots kindly flew multiple times to ensure all the eager children had a chance. The outcomes were promising; aside from a few mistakes, the children successfully located most of the turning points and identified the photos.
The rather small crowd was treated to a visit by a North American Harvard flown in by owner Hennie Delport, who was joined by his son Hendre. Hennie is the owner of Phoebus Apollo Aviation based at Rand Airport, his son has very recently qualified as an A380 Captain and was visiting from the Sandpit.
The excessive rain did bring out some very unwelcome visitors; the airfield was taken over by a swarm of rather small and irritating flying ants that decided to try to end their miserable existence by flying into the mouths, ears and any other exposed orifice of everyone that ventured onto the flight line. The aircraft weren’t safe either; they seemed to be attracted to the heat of the recently flown engines. One could be forgiven for thinking they were in the Australian Outback, battling the persistent flies.
The day didn't go as Tedderfield or Sling had planned because of the bad weather, but I'm confident there will be many more days in the future blessed with the weather that Sunny South Africa is renowned for worldwide.
