I fly from Haverfordwest and when I first flew from there in 2001 keeping my Frozen ATPL current the chap running the commercial side of the airfield was John Rees - one of lifes real characters.
When I started to fly G-JBTR the commercial side was then run by Johns son Joe. Although primarily a farming family, whos farm (Poyston) was at the North East corner of the airfield, both John and Joe had a passion for flying.
There was many a time I would pop in to the Chief Pilots office to catch Joe there with Gywndaf and put the world to rights and be royally entertained by thier banter.
A few weeks ago I was shocked to Joe had had a heart attack just before I attended the LAA Rally. No problem it would be a warning one and he'd be fine after changing his life style ..... saddly not as 10 days later Joe passed away at the far too young an age of 51.
I wanted to pay my respects by conducting a flypast and along with: * Barry Gwynett (the photo shoot pilot for my amazing photo book and many years ago Joe pulled him out of crashed Quickie with Richard Cole) - Line astern in his RV8 * Nick Lambe in his EAA Biplane with black streamers * Richard Cole and Matt Gregory each flying one of Joes Cessna 172s
Apparently the flypast caused a few tears but I was proud to be part of saying goodbye to someone who loved life and flying but was far too young .... RIP Joe
