Jerry Parr
Aviation has always been a part of my life. My father was in the RAF and before that, he was a de Havilland Technical School apprentice and whilst he was at Hatfield, learnt to fly at nearby Panshanger.
My early years were spent in Singapore and Cyprus, as well as the UK - fairly typical of being a member of an RAF family at that time. My secondary education was in Grantham and eventually my family settled in Peterborough.
Following in my brother's footsteps, I joined the RAF as an aircraft engineer in 1981 and spent three years training at RAF Halton as an airframe/engines technician apprentice. From RAF Halton, I was posted to RAF Wyton working on Canberras for six years. In 1990 I left the RAF to work at Sibson Aerodrome maintaining the flying school fleet and did so for the next 12 years.
In 2003 I was invited to join the British Airways Flying Club engineering team at Wycombe Air Park, initially as Deputy Chief Engineer and then as Chief Engineer for eight years. Here, in addition to the club fleet we maintained over 30 private aircraft. In 2013, I moved 100m north to ATS Engineering as Chief Engineer and have left there to join the LAA Engineering team. I am both an LAA inspector and EASA Part-66/BCAR licenced engineer.
At school I was in the CCF and fortunate enough to be granted an RAF Flying Scholarship in 1979. I asked for somewhere near Peterborough and, in true RAF fashion, was promptly despatched to Dundee. At the time, I had also been gliding with the RAFGSA for a number of years. Once stationed at RAF Wyton, I revalidated my PPL at Sibson and flew from there until moving down to Wycombe.
Having attended many PFA Rallies, in the early 90s, a friend and I were impressed by Graham Newby’s article on building an RV-6, so embarked on a quick 8 year build of a flat pack RV-6 kit which was completed in 2000. We sold the RV-6 in 2009 and then a couple of years later I decided to build an RV-12 with another couple of friends which we operated for nine years.
February 2021
