Great West Aerodrome

The Great West Aerodrome, also known as Harmondsworth Aerodrome or Heathrow Aerodrome, was a grass airfield, operational between 1930 and 1944. It was on the southeast edge of the hamlet of Heathrow, in the parish of Harmondsworth. The Fairey Aviation Company owned and operated it, for assembly and flight testing of Fairey-manufactured aircraft. The area was to later be the site of London Heathrow Airport.

Since 1915, Fairey Aviation had been assembling and flight testing its aircraft from Northolt Aerodrome, but in 1928 the Air Ministry gave it notice to cease using Northolt. Fairey Aviation needed an airfield for flight testing of aircraft designed and manufactured at its factory in North Hyde Road, Hayes. Its chief test pilot, Norman Macmillan, recalled a forced landing and take-off at Heathrow in 1925. He had noted the flatness of the land, and therefore recommended the area as suitable for an aerodrome. Macmillan flew aerial surveys of the site, then used for market gardening. In 1929, Fairey Aviation started by buying four plots of adjoining farmland in the hamlet of Heathrow from four local landowners: see History of Heathrow Airport#1930s. The total was 148 acres , at about £1,500, at the typical 1929 farmland market rate of £10 per acre. The site was bounded to the north-east by Cain's Lane, to the south by the Duke of Northumberland's River, and to the west by High Tree Lane. The airfield boundaries were south of the Bath Road, north-west of the Great South West Road, and about two miles west of the west end of the Great West Road. The airfield was about three miles by road from the Hayes factory, and it was declared operational in June 1930. That year, an additional plot of 29 acres was bought, and a hangar was built.

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