Weybridge
Note: This map gives the position of BROOKLANDS
WEYBRIDGE: Also known as BROOKLANDS
Manufacturing: From 1919: Vickers (They moved here from JOYCE GREEN, KENT, in 1919)
Note: The size and scale of the Vickers factory bore no resemblance to the 'sheds' erected for aircraft manufacturing on BROOKLANDS prior to WW1. See the seperate listing of BROOKLANDS for more information.
NOTE: In producing this 'Guide' over the last twenty years or so, (by 2020), I have become very wary of jumping to conclusions. Once upon a time I would have taken it for granted that a mention of WEYBRIDGE must be referring to BROOKLANDS. But, on the other hand, BROOKLANDS was already a very famous site, so why refer to WEYBRIDGE instead of BROOKLANDS?
It is of course very easy to make such assumptions, but I have been caught out many times so it seems well worth while to make this listing. Any advice will be much appreciated.
For example I came across this account: Major Batchelor, (the inventor of the RNAS Bomb-Dropping Mirror and Course Recorder), died when his H.P. 0/400 crashed on take-off from WEYBRIDGE on the 22nd April 1919.
The way in which various airfields have been named has of course been a constant source of annoyance, frustration and complexity in preparing this 'Guide'. On the plus side, also a subject which in itself becomes more fascinating over the years.
It appears that an argument still exists as to what the correct naming of WEYBRIDGE should be. I now reckon the fairest answer is that the Vickers factory should be called WEYBRIDGE and the adjacent airfield BROOKLANDS. And of course, with so many people looking at this web-site from all over the world, (over 380,000 in January 2020), it cannot be expected that too many can appreciate the small distinction between WEYBRIDGE and BROOKLANDS. On this basis alone it seems that a seperate entry for WEYBRIDGE is easily justified.
A PERSONAL MEMORY
I can just about remember watching the televised first take-off of the VC.10 from, (as I remember called WEYBRIDGE during the reporting?), and today I’m astonished at just how capable that magnificent STOL airliner was. It now appears that an extension to the runway was built, for the VC.10 to take-off, but it seems from records that it was airborne in little more than four hundred metres!
However, what we also have to take into account is the distance needed to abandon the take-off before V.1 - the speed beyond which a take-off cannot be safely terminated.
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