The drone rangers

By Tim Cross

There is a throwback quality to Popham airfield: it consists of a pair of grass runways and a handful of sheds set atop a low hill deep in the Hampshire countryside. A sign at the entrance informs visitors that it is home to the Spitfire Flying Club, whose 400 members devote themselves to the piston-engined, propellor-powered aircraft that first flew 80 years ago. When I arrive, a few dozen cars and camper vans are parked on the grass, with perhaps a hundred men – and only a handful of women – milling around. Foldable camp chairs are dotted about, with limp, plastic-wrapped sandwiches stowed underneath to protect them from the light drizzle that is, inevitably, falling.