The key storm moment was about 10am to 2pm. London City seemed closed all morning, except most surprisingly about 11am a Citation business jet departed right in the teeth of it; some exec presumably having convinced his crew of his importance over the tempest.

After about 5pm it had substantially died down, and London City suddenly came to life, all the fleet were sent off. I believe some people had just waited the day out in the departure lounge.

The commentator on Big Jet TV is a complete buffoon who appears to have little clue about aviation, makes it up as he goes along, and just whoops up the commentary for the excitement of children.

I believe after the switch to Wichita there was still production of key major elements in Chester, where of course all the machine tools and jigs etc were located. I don't know how many more they built in the USA, but quite likely Chester did a big final run of components, shipped them all over, and shut down; the Wichita line would use up these remaining ones, and then that would be it.

The runway at Chester has had odd scheduled services over time, most notably British Eagle Viscounts to London in the 1960s. A few years ago I travelled from London City to Isle of Man, which at the time was a BA route, where they subcontracted in an Eastern Airways Saab 2000 in BA livery. However, this day it wasn't available, and another of the Eastern fleet, in their own livery, had been sent in to substitute. Digging in to my seat pocket I found a boarding card stub, a standard airline computer-printed one, for Chester to Toulouse from two days earlier. Eastern at the time had a contract for a daily flight between these two major Airbus facilities. You also get on many days at Chester the outsize custom-built Airbus freighters taking components, especially complete wings, elsewhere; these can be seen turning for final approach overhead Liverpool airport, which is not that far away by air, but because of two separate estuaries a considerable road journey.