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Cardiff Heliport

The heliport is owned by Cardiff Council, but Veritair Ltd (trading as British International, subsequently changed to Veritair Aviation) have a long term lease on the facility^[2]. The heliport cost £3.8 million to build and was the operating base for the South Wales Police helicopter. But the heliport can also handle considerable passenger traffic too, especially during major sporting events at the Millennium Stadium. It can handle over 180 movements in a single day with up to 40 aircraft parked at any one time^[3].

The South Wales Police contract involving 2 Twin Squirrel AS355F2 aircraft (G-SEWP and G-SYPA) ended on 31 January 2008, when the contract transferred to Bond Helicopters operating EC135 aircraft at a new base at St Athan, Vale of Glamorgan.

In May 2008 the business of British International at Cardiff was sold to the management team lead by Captain Julian Verity. The new company is called Veritair Aviation

Plans have been announced to create a PPL(H) Flight Training School based on Robinson aircraft and it is said that Avgas will be available later in the summer.

Aircraft chiefly operating from Cardiff are AS355N G-STON, AS355F2 G-SEWP, BO105bd4 G-BTKL and Bell 407 G-OZAC, owned by HeliLux/GRYPHON AVIATION.

Edouard Pingret

Edouard Pingret, (Henri-Theophile) [Eduardo], (b. Saint-Quentin, Aisne, 30 December 1788; d. Saint-Quentin, 1875). Edouard Pingret was a French painter and lithographer. He was the son of a middle class family in a mainly agricultural region, but also home to the celebrated General Cambronne and to illustrious notaries and Normandy judges. Pingret's father, Henri Pingret Jullien, was related to the highest spheres of the Protestant aristocracy, and took up the practice of law in 1781. During the French Revolution, his father was named a representative of the Department of Aisne at the Revolutionary Convention, which required him to maintain a secondary residence in the capital of France, Paris.

Pingret studied under painter Jacques-Louis David as well as Jean-Baptiste Regnault; studied also at the Academy of Saint Luke in Rome. Exhibited Paris salons, 1810 onward. Was appointed a Knight of the Legion of Honor, 1831. From 1850 to 1855 he lived and worked in Mexico City, exhibiting annually at the Academia de Bellas Artes. He produced outstanding portraits, including those of Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte (1808) in France and General Mariano Arista (1851; Mexico City, Mus. N. Hist.). His most important works in Mexico were costumbrista genre scenes. Was also an illustrator of monographs such as "Voyage de S.M. Louis-Philippe Ier Roi des Francais au Chateau de Winsdor. Dedie A S. M. Victoria, Reine d'Angleterre." Ed. Pingret , Paris and Ackermann, London, 1846. Large folio, with 25 lithographed plates, some tinted.