NORTH EALING: Private flying field

Operated by: Mr H Piffard

Location: On Hangar Hill Farm, W of Masons Green Lane, near North Ealing tube station.

Period of operation: 1909 only?

Runway: Wooden ‘runway’ constructed of railway sleepers, presumably with rails


NOTES: It seems that Mr Harold Piffard, (some records spell his name Pilfard and Pifford), achieved ‘controllable’ hops of up to 100 yards, (90m). There is a report of a sign at this site saying, ‘West Ealing Flying School’ at about this time. The only slight problem being that this site isn’t in West Ealing – it was either in North Ealing or North Acton. It then appears Mr Piffard moved his operations to SHOREHAM (SUSSEX) in 1910, therefore being the first British aviator to use, roughly speaking, that now famous site in SUSSEX?.

In British Built Aircraft Vol.3 Ron Smith has this to say about Mr Piffard: “Harold Piffard….was an artist who had an interest in ballooning before turning to powered flight. The first Piffard design was a pusher biplane with long, curved forward skids rather like a biplane Valkyrie. The first design was constructed in Ealing in 1909, was powered by an eight-cylinder 40hp ENV engine and was tested at Shoreham.”

Aaaah, don’t you just love history? It begs the obvious question, did Piffard build and design two aircraft, or was the ‘machine’ he took to SHOREHAM the one in which he achieved ‘controllable’ hops? I would venture that the amount of residential property emerging in Ealing around this time probably made the flying site here unviable? And therefore, he turned his attention to flying off water, as many others did in those early years. Flying off water, despite its obvious drawbacks for overcoming the extra aerodynamic drag involved by having floats attached , offered early aviators a far larger area from which to experiment in, or from. Compared to just a grass field.

 A report by the Acton History Group states: “In 1909, the pioneer aviator, Harold Pifford was experimenting with flight from a field in North Acton, managing to fly at a height of a couple of feet for about 100 yards in a biplane constructed in his studio at Bedford Park. Unfortunately, the aircraft was destroyed by a gale soon after its first flight and Pifford moved to Sussex to continue his experiments.” The site in Sussex was in Shoreham and it appears he used the River Adur for his seaplane experiments which runs just to the east of Shoreham Airport.



This does of course beg the question; why did he not use the nearby 'aerodrome' site in PARK ROYAL, possibly the same site as used by Grahame-White? The answer will probably never be known but it was common enough practise, especially up to WW2, for those with competing aviation interests to prefer having their own site. Which is why, for example, that in 1934 the Isle of Wight had six aerodromes, and five of these aerodromes serving as 'airports' for seperate airlines during the few years preceeding WW2.


What never ceases to interest me, and this is a good enough example, is that you can find several reports concerning the same subject, all compiled by experts, but differing in detail.