Heated Runways

I am being told by someone who seems to think he is in the know that RAF Sculthorpe in Norfolk had a heated runway. To my knowledge this is not the case.

He is unable to provide proof or evidence to back up is claim. It seems there are mixed views with some rather impressionable people believing this was the case where as the more knowledgeable people all dispute the claim the runway there was heated.

I cannot find any shed of credible evidence that the heated runway existed at Sculthorpe.

I am happy to be proved wrong if it is heated, which I doubt. But is does bring into question the technology that would be used in the 50's, 60's and 70's for a heated runway when heating the barrack blocks were a problem at the time!

Please discuss

Cheers

Rich

I'd forgotten about the Die Hard film, great film too! I would imagine thats the usual hollywood take on it. It would make sense for some commercial airports to have such as system due to the amount of movements they have. I can't imagine they would be viable though do to reliability and cost.

On a sleepy airbase though, it really doesn't make any logical sense. Apparently there is evidence on 'heated' runway at Sculthorpe which I am very sceptical about. However the person who has told me seems to think its ok to go through the fence of an active MoD site so I am not prepared to do this unless I can arrange proper access.

A lot of The Die Hard film was shot at Mirabel, have not looked it up yet but I am guessing if they did have heated runways the world would know.

Having worked at Sculthorpe, first Ive heard of it, suspect its nonsense.

There was a trial done in Edinburgh in the late fifties of the Mound(just off Princes st ) electric heating cables put in in.

If the entire runway was electrically heated at 10 watts per square foot (which would be an absolute minimum). Then approx 20 power stations the capacity of Sizewell B would be required to provide the energy. Admittedly the entire runway would almost certainly not be heated, but one gets the idea.

When researching FIDO it soon became clear that there is a huge amount of energy in a single gallon of petrol. Exponents of 'let's introduce electric cars as quickly as possible' need to be aware of this.

I have heard of this about Sculthorpe before.

After working in a house where underfloor heating was installed in an extension and seeing the upgrading needed to the electric main coming into the house, not to mention the consumer unit(s) I dread to think what arrangements would have to be made for a heated runway if it was electric!
A massive substation nearby and numerous buildings on the airfield to distribute the supply.
I believe that an underfloor system in a domestic environment runs at about 100W sq/M for a concrete floor.
With a 9000ft runway and lets say it's 150ft wide that is 1,350,000 sq/ft..
I'll let someone else convert that to M and then multiply by 100W
If the runway width was the full 300ft..............!!


If it was heated by oil/petroleum then I would expect signs of a boiler house somewhere. and large fuel storage.(unless that was at Massignham!)


Would it end with the runway being heated?
What about taxiways and dispersals?

canberra wrote:

Having worked at Sculthorpe, first Ive heard of it, suspect its nonsense.

There was a trial done in Edinburgh in the late fifties of the Mound(just off Princes st ) electric heating cables put in in.

Agree with your first point, the question would be why bother in the place. Just curious, how many hours are lost to flying because of snow clearing operations?

Interestingly Montreal was/is considering heated sidewalks (dont say pavement out here that means the road!!!) montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/are-...od-idea-for-montreal