Could cause some issues for NACATC in time…
so long as it won’t be this summer I’m fine with that.
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Could always take up canoeing and sailing 
That time they installed a climbing wall… as an escape route
Why do you think the RAF were so keen to relocate?
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The long term plan to give Fairbourne up to the sea has been known about for years, it isn’t new news.
Exactly. The issue isn’t if we lose NACATC Fairbourne, it’s when.
What we don’t appear to have is any contingency plan for the next Centre.
I hear Llanbedr is nice.
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Pretty low level too though!
I presume that the Fairbourne move was done mainly for the political issue of keeping the employment in the local area (catering staff) for the next decade or two, at which point no-one knows who will be in power or what the ATC/RAFAC will need, if we exist at all by then. It would then be much easier to close Fairbourne down as there wouldn’t be any local people still living there.
As for future AT Centre, I look forward to the ‘Vision’ document of 2040 to start telling you all about it. I will have retired long before then - currently thinking by 2020!
I hear there are nice places down south too!
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There is an argument that having both NACATCs in the middle of the country isn’t necessarily that ideal.
Perhaps a purple solution scattered across the country might be the ideal solution.
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Perhaps even expand the RAC’s to cover Adventure Training as well as AeroSpace. . .
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took a trip down memory lane to Capel and Llanbedr a few weeks ago, the accommodation has been flattened, just one building for the ATC unit and the shooting range left there.
Get out.
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Better places further north over a border 
TBH there are activity centres across the UK. OK you may pay more but at the end of the day if the cadets have a good time, I’m not sure they care and neither do the parents. The single biggest problem with anywhere in the UK for the majority of squadrons is transport. We do DofE expeds with other squadrons and the biggest problem is transport.
We use one which has all sorts of activities and not just the traditional things, trained and qualified staff, so removes some the Air Cadets staffing requirement. We use a local one for a day’s activities, parents drop off and pick up, job done, cadets go home tired and happy.
If you think the main strength of the NACATCs is the summer camps, you don’t appreciate its true value.
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Best solution would be for the MOD to allocated some former airfields to the ATC. Say 12. 2 per region.
Turn them into all singing all dancing activity centers. Flying, gliding, shooting, adv trg.
RAFAC Stations if you will running 7 days a week.
Would cost, but wouldnt it be amazing.
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So what can you get out of them, that can’t be done elsewhere, that isn’t so remote from the majority of the UK?
Our wing has only ever had term time dates at the activity centres which creates a low demand, even in the originating sqns. I’ve never seen the letter from HQAC sway any of our local schools.
The staff courses?
Seriously, the staff courses are their greatest asset, we can achieve properly regulated qualifications at a fraction of the cost in the private sector. Just this month I undertook my Paddlesports Leader training, on the open market that course would have cost me roughly £185, plus transport to somewhere suitable to do it, plus accommodation. I got that course for less than £40, including accommodation, transport costs and equipment. (And I get “paid!”) My 3 Star award in white water was the same cost, that was a five day course with a coach, in North Wales, with everything I needed. The private cost for such a course would be almost prohibitive for many staff.
Those courses, and many others like them mean that staff can deliver training anywhere. It’s a crying shame that more staff don’t take advantage of them. Just last year, the corps had so little staff wanting to do their level one coaching course that the corps arranged for the few of us who did to tag along on a private course. In previous years we’ve had enough candidates within the organisation to run that course with solely RAFAC staff.
It’s because of the staff courses that the centres need to be where they are, is somewhere similar. You could hardly run an ML course out of St Mawgan, or a mountain biking course out of Boscombe Down.
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