Plane Crazy Down Under » Events

PCDU and Aus Air Services Christmas Fly In – Tooradin Victoria – December 17th

steve — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 06:26:33 +0000

Come and join us on December 17th at Tooradin Airport (YTDN) as we dust off the mobile studio and have some fun with our friends at Aus Air Services

Grant, Steve and Anthony “The Infrequent Flyer” Simmons will be in attendance to record an episode of the show, assisted by Allan Van’t Padje who’ll be setting up an array of speaker towers and running the panel

BBQ, drinks and discounts on flights all weekend!

We hope to meet you there!

Plane Crazy Down Under – Out and About!

steve — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 04:11:25 +0000

The team with the mobile studio at Coldstream

Not all PCDU material is recorded in the studio and over Skype. We also get out and about in the aviation community with our mobile studio. We can attend your aviation event to record interviews or entire shows, provide commentary, or entertain your guests with pre recorded content from previous PCDU shows.

We can also provide up to 12 high quality weather proofed speaker towers to cater for any occasion – enough to stretch along 300 metres of flight line!

Steve & Grant recording at NatFly 2011 in Temora

Recording content with guests and speakers at your aviation event allows your message to be spread more widely through inclusion in our podcast series.

If you’d like to have Grant, Steve and the PCDU team attend your next aviation event, email us at planecrazydownunder@gmail.com

Our Oshkosh 2011 Coverage (Oshcasts 1, 2 & 3 and Beyond)

Grant (Falcon124) — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 16:04:08 +0000

AirVenture Oshkosh 2011 was an incredible experience for the team from PCDU, one that we’re all still getting over. There was so much to do & see and so many wonderful people to meet, naturally we weren’t able to do all we would have liked to. One of the tasks we had that fell by the wayside in the rush was putting out daily updates. Maybe if Grant could have found some RedBull on site, they might have made it out each day :)

Now that we’re back in Australia, we’re being kept pretty busy catching up with our families, getting back on top of everything at our “day jobs” and working through all the content we’ve gathered. It’s going to take a few months to get it all completed, but we’re working on it as best we can :)

You can find the daily reports in our PCDU Commentaries blog as we’ll be creating an Oshkosh 2011 Summary page as we did for Avalon 2011. For now, we have a few of the daily reports completed and loading episodes featuring the additional Oshkosh content we’ve not already released.

Daily Blog Reports:
Day 1 – Getting there isn’t always the best part!
Day 2 – Rockford Bonanza
Day 3 – Arrival en Mass

Audio Episodes:
Oshcast #1
Oshcast #2
Oshcast #3 (Hugging Your Roo)
Episode 73:Oshkosh:The Greatest Show on Earth

What do you want from Oshkosh 2011?

Grant (Falcon124) — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 05:19:22 +0000

It is our intention to cover Oshkosh from a “down under” perspective to the best of our ability. We’ll be looking for the Aussie/Kiwi angle from attendees to volunteers to businesses to government agencies. We plan to produce three episodes during the week of the show and provide constant coverage on our home page, at Aviation Advertiser and through various social media portals. This will include a mixture of audio, video and photographs, presented with the aim of giving you a genuine feel for the spectacle that is AirVenture 2011. As was the case with our Avalon 2011 coverage, we anticipate several follow up episodes featuring additional content after the event. Steve will also be travelling to Arkansas, the place where he completed the bulk of his flight training, to collect interviews with some of the people that influenced his passion for aviation.

We would like to offer our audience the chance to give us some indications of what you’d like to see, hear and (virtually) experience about Oshkosh while we’re over there. By posting your own comments on our updates, you can give us some direction and we’ll try to come through for you if we can.

Joining us at Oshkosh will be Bas Scheffers and David Vanderhoof as well as Mike Wilson who is going to help us with transport, camera and other technical work. We’ve received some amazing sponsorship from Pracy Racing and Jetride Australia who have covered our airfares to Chicago and back (thanks guys!!!! :) while Aviation Advertiser is chipping in to help cover a lot of the accommodation and food costs while we’re there. This has helped immensely but we’re still going to be out of pocket a rather large amount and we’d like to chip in some $$$ to say THANKS to our friends who’ll be helping us while they’re there.

If you’d like to help ensure we can get the coverage you want to hear, feel free to chip in some $$$ via the DONATE button on our home page. We’ve already received a few “Go hard!” packages from friends and every little bit helps. The more we get the more chances we have of being able to run around & pump out the content you want to hear, read & see.

As always, we are not entirely comfortable asking our audience for donations, however, this is a huge undertaking which may exceed the generous funding levels of our wonderful sponsors. In this unique instance, we ask you to consider the substantial effort we put into this programme, entirely on our own time, and give away each month at no cost. We believe our product compares favourably to monthly print publications, yet for less than the cost of a magazine you can help us achieve our goals on your behalf. Your financial assistance for this series of shows would be greatly and humbly appreciated.

We’re really looking forward to this and no matter what, we’re going to bring you along for the ride :)

Meanwhile, here’s the latest animated video from our friends at Thromby Airlines about their foray into online media and podcasters. We hope you enjoy it and recommend you visit their site for more great Thromby Air fun.

We’re going to Oshkosh 2011!

Grant (Falcon124) — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 23:55:03 +0000

As announced in our latest episode (Episode 67: Team Pracy: Racing, JetRides & Aircraft Imports), Steve & Grant will be going to Oshkosh 2011. YAY!!!! :)

Thanks to a generous offer from Team Pracy (see JetRide Australia, Aircraft Imports and Pracy Racing), we’re going to be at Oshkosh 2011 for the whole week. We’re also picking up some additional sponsorship and assistance from other groups, including the fine folks at Aviation Advertiser, to help cover the costs of setting up camp on site (yes, we’ll be camping on the field in the midst of the action :)

In addition to Steve & Grant, Bas Scheffers will also be at Oshkosh 2011 as he’s had his tickets & plans locked in for a very long time. We’re also going to be joined by David Vanderhoof, our code-sharing historian who also appears on the Airplane Geeks podcast. In fact, for a while we thought Bas & David were going to be the sole PCDU representatives at the show.

Suffice to say we’re very excited to be going and so long as our heads don’t explode with the torrent of aviation joy surrounding us, you can expect to get heaps of Oshkosh content with a Down Under perspective as Plane Crazy Down Under embarks on the “Up & Over to Oshkosh” tour :)

RAAF Air Pilgrimage at Point Cook

Grant (Falcon124) — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 23:25:39 +0000

On March 31st the RAAF Air Pilgrimage fleet arrived at the RAAF Museum at Point Cook after spending three days flying from Temora to Tocumwal to Ballarat and then to Pt Cook. Celebrating the 90th birthday of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), the flight consisted of warbirds, antiques and GA Aircraft. We were onsite at Pt Cook for the arrival of the aircraft and recorded a number of discussions with people on the flight line. You can hear the full content in Episode 61: The Great Pilgrimage, see some of the photos we took on our RAAF Pilgrimage Flickr page and watch a summary video below:

www.flickr.com

Plane Crazy Down Under's RAAF PILGRAMAGE 2011 photoset

Catching up with Owen Zupp at Point Cook

Grant (Falcon124) — Wed, 12 May 2010 22:30:59 +0000

Owen Zupp will be arriving at Point Cook on Sunday the 16th by about 12:30 so he can be on the ground before the RAAF Museum’s 1pm flying display starts. We’re going to be on site to meet up with him and watch the display.

If any of you are in Melbourne then come on . . . → Read More: Catching up with Owen Zupp at Point Cook

Pending GAAP to Class D conversion

Grant (Falcon124) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 10:17:35 +0000

In June of this year, Australia’s General Aviation Aerodrome Procedures (GAAP) airports are going to convert a US FAA based Class D airspace. We’re trying to arrange an episode dedicated to this topic before June but meanwhile, the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) have arranged a number of workshops around the country for pilots to learn about the changes and how they will affect them.

If you haven’t already, go to the CASA GAAP page and follow the links there to sign up. This is critical not only for any pilot who flies at these airports but even those who fly near them. You never know when you may have to divert to one. Besides, as Bas Scheffers points out in his CTAF(R) blog article on these workshops, it’ll be a great way to meet pilots in your area :)

Meetup at the Centenary of Powered Flight Airshow

Grant (Falcon124) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 23:14:10 +0000

The Centenary Air Show is being held this Saturday (20th March) at Diggers Rest near Melbourne. The air show is being held to celebrate 100 years of controlled powered flight in Australia and will feature flying & static displays along with other entertainment and attractions.

Naturally we will both be there which no doubt means Grant will be busy tweeting & texting madly yet again. We’re going to be interviewing pilots, crew & staff, meeting up with folks and hopefully lining up a few visits & reports for future episodes.

If you’re going to be at the airshow (and let’s face it, you should be :) then post a message here or in the forums, email us, tweet us or SMS us on the day to arrange a meet up. The weather is looking pretty friendly with predictions of light winds, a few clouds and a top of 26 Celsius.

NOTE: The start of the flying display will have Ken Evers & Tim Pryse flying off in their Gippsland Aeronautics GA-8 Airvan to start their Millions Against Malaria around the world journey. You may recall that we interviewed them in Episode 27: Trans World Adventures :)

Meet up at Point Cook Air Pageant

Grant (Falcon124) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 11:09:43 +0000

If you’re going to the RAAF Museum’s Point Cook Air Pageant this weekend (Feb 28th) then post a comment here or send a tweet to @PCDU, @Falcon124 or @SteveVisscher to let us know. We’ll try and organise a meet up somewhere before the show starts depending on who’s around and what interview slots we manage . . . → Read More: Meet up at Point Cook Air Pageant

Ten minutes of fame in a 737 Simulator?

Grant (Falcon124) — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 22:35:10 +0000

The crew at Flight Experience Melbourne are having an Open Night on the 27th January and we’re going along. They’re giving away 10 minute sessions in their 737 sim to the first 20 people in the door (need to register before hand).

We’re going to be there to interview people for a future episode as well as have some fun (and enjoy the drinks & nibbles :)

If you’re in Melbourne, Australia and can get to the QV Building in the city from 6pm on the 27th January, you really should get yourself there. More information about the event and the registration form is available on their blog.

Hope to see you there :)

Combined PCDU/UCAP Meet Up at Temora

Grant (Falcon124) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:25:28 +0000

Looks like a few of the PCDU listeners are going to fly from Essendon Airport (YMEN) to Temora (YTEM) to catch the Temora Aviation Museum‘s next flying days on October 24th & 25th. I had planned to go up there to catch the show and interview some of the staff, pilots and engineers, although I’d originally planned to drive up & back. I’d prefer to fly up there but it depends on weather and if those doing the flying are staying for both days.

As if you didn’t need enough reasons to go and check out the flying at Temora, Matt Hall is going to be flying his Mustang there. It promises to be quite the experience!

Given a bunch of us will be up there, we’re considering doing a combined PCDU/UCAP meet up. Depending on when people are going to be there, we’ll do it on one or both days of the show and/or arrange a dinner session on the Saturday night.

If you’re interested in meeting up at Temora, please post here and let us know. Tell us whether you want to fly yourself there, drive or come along as a passenger in one of the planes if space permits.

TweetUp at the Asia Pacific Aviation Outlook Summit 2009

Grant (Falcon124) — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 00:07:47 +0000

From the 3rd to 6th of August 2009, the Asia Pacific Aviation Outlook Summit 2009 is being held in Sydney at the Four Seasons Hotel down at the Rocks end of George St (near the Harbour). Shashank Nigam from SimpliFlying will be in town to attend the conference and present a keynote.

You may have heard Shashank interviewed on episode 29 of the Airplane Geeks podcast. He’s also been interviewed on CNBC Arabia, the Things With Wings blog at Aviation Week, Asian Airlines & Airports (PDF) and many other places.

I’m going to fly up to Sydney for the day on the 5th August to meet Shashank and interview him for the podcast. We’re also going to hold a combined SimpliFlying/PCDU TweetUp while we’re there.

In addition to having a drink and mixing with other aviation enthusiasts, the event will also offer a panel discussion moderated by Shashank and featuring Karla Courtney from the Frequent Buyer blog and myself. More panelists are being arranged and I’ll list them as they sign up.

Update: Karla’s going to be at the Summit on behalf of her work with the QANTAS Travel Insider site and their associated Twitter account, QFTravelInsider.

You’re more than welcome to come and ask questions, suggest topics and otherwise join in. Dress is smart casual and we’ll be starting at 5:30 on Wednesday 5th of August.

Sign up to follow the event via TwtVite and Facebook. You can also post a comment here or email us so we can keep you updated about when & where we’re meeting.

So, if you’re in Sydney on the 5th of August and can make it down to the rocks from 5:30 onwards (exact venue to be confirmed), you’re more than welcome to come and join us for a few drinks and join in the discussion. It promises to be a great night of fun and information.

Update: Venue has been locked in: Top level bar at Jacksons on George (176 George St) – looking forward to seeing you all there :)