In mid-2024, The Heritage Aircraft Trust, made the decision to move its operations from its long-term base at North Weald Airfield in Essex to St Athan airfield near Cardiff in South Wales.

This move was quite a logistical challenge as it entailed moving its operating Company – Heritage Aircraft Limited – plus all of its aircraft, spares inventory and engineering force the 200 miles to Wales.

Whilst three of the aircraft were able to be flown down to St Athan, this left a further two aircraft which were not yet fully airworthy and approved for flight by the CAA. These aircraft required a complex logistical plan to be formed for a road move by specialist contractors. Fortunately all went fairly smoothly and the airframes had all arrived at St Athan by the end of 2024.

The move was finally completed by Christmas of 2024 and the first half of 2025 has been consumed in working with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to re-establish all of our existing maintenance and airworthiness (CAMO) approvals to the new premises.

We are pleased to report that, as of August 2025, we are now fully re-approved by the CAA and have already flown our Yellowjacks Gnat (G-MOUR) quite extensively. Meanwhile our ex-RAF Valley 4FTS airframe (G-RORI) has had a Major service at St Athan and will also very shortly be joining G-MOUR on the flightline.

It is also hoped that our ex-Indian Air Force (IAF) Gnat F1 fighter will also take to the skies of South Wales before the end of 2025, as the restoration work is now fully complete after nearly 10 years. Watch this space.