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RAF South Cerney

Former RAF station in Gloucestershire, England

Summary

Former RAF station in Gloucestershire, England

Field	Value
name	RAF South Cerney
ensign	Ensign of the Royal Air Force.svg
ensign_size	90px
partof
location	South Cerney, Gloucestershire
country	England
image	[[File:Control Tower on the Airfield (geograph 2541212).jpg	250px]]
caption	Control Tower on the Airfield
image2
type	Royal Air Force Station
coordinates
pushpin_map	Gloucestershire#UK
pushpin_map_caption	Shown within Gloucestershire
pushpin_label	RAF South Cerney
ownership	Ministry of Defence
operator	Royal Air Force
controlledby	RAF Flying Training Command
open_to_public
site_other_label
site_other
site_area
code
built
used	1937 -
battles	European theatre of World War II
past_commanders
garrison
occupants
footnotes
ICAO	EGCY
elevation	111 m
r1-number	01/19
r1-length	892 m
r1-surface	Grass
r2-number	09/27
r2-length	983 m
r2-surface	Grass
h1-length
airfield_other_label
airfield_other

| r1-number = 01/19 | r1-length = 892 m | r1-surface = Grass | r2-number = 09/27 | r2-length = 983 m | r2-surface = Grass | h1-number = | h1-length = | h1-surface = Royal Air Force South Cerney or more simply RAF South Cerney is a former Royal Air Force station located in South Cerney near Cirencester in Gloucestershire, England. It was built during the 1930s to conduct flying training. The airfield was turned over to the British Army in 1971 and is now known as the Duke of Gloucester Barracks.

History

Construction of the airfield began in 1936 and it was still underway when it opened on 16 August 1937. No. 3 Flying Training School was the initial tenant and was equipped with a variety of biplane aircraft which were replaced by Airspeed Oxfords in mid-1938. When the Second World War began in August 1939, the school was redesignated as a Service Flying Training School (SFTS) and was equipped with 44 Oxfords and 31 Hawker Harts. Shortly afterwards the headquarters of No. 23 Group RAF, responsible for advanced flying training, was transferred to South Cerney with its communications flight. By the late summer of 1940, the Oxfords had replaced all of the Harts and the school was dedicated to multi-engine training.

No. 15 Service Flying Training School RAF was transferred to the base in early June 1940 with its Oxfords and North American Harvard trainers, but it moved to RAF Kidlington at the end of August. Soon afterwards, the syllabus of 3 SFTS changed to intermediate flying training and it continued in this role until 14 March 1942 when it was converted into No. 3 (Pilots) Advanced Flying Unit RAF to orient foreign-trained pilot to British conditions and standards.

During the Second World War a number of training units were posted to the airfield:

No. 1 Initial Training School
No. 2 Flying Training School RAF
No. 27 Group Communication Flight RAF
No. 83 Gliding School RAF
No. 1519 (Beam Approach Training) Flight RAF
No. 1539 (Beam Approach Training) Flight RAF
Air Crew Allocation Unit
Aircrew Officer Training School

The airfield was handed over to the Army on 1 July 1971 and was renamed the Duke of Gloucester Barracks.

Parts of "Piece of Cake", a 1988 British six-part television serial depicting the fictional life of a Royal Air Force fighter squadron during the first year of the Second World War, were filmed here.

Runways

The site has two short runways that are regularly used by two commercial freefall parachuting businesses.

References

Citations

Bibliography

References

Berryman, pp. 276–77
Berryman, p. 278
"South Cerney". [[Airfields of Britain Conservation Trust]].
Berryman, p. 279
[http://skydivesouthcerney.co.uk/ Skydive South Cerney] {{webarchive. link. (19 March 2011)
"Welcome to the SILVER STARS Website". Silver Stars - RLC Parachute Centre.

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

military-airbases-closed-in-1971 military-parachuting-in-the-united-kingdom royal-air-force-stations-in-gloucestershire military-airbases-established-in-1937

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