House & Helicopter

Georgina Hunter-Jones

The Cicare SVH-3 helicopter simulator visits Brynkinalt estate in Wales.

The Cicare SVH-3 helicopter simulator, shown at Brynkinalt, seat of the Rt. Hon. Lord Trevor, 5th Baron, whose family has lived on the site of the present house since 924. The Trevors are direct descendants of a union which took place in 942 between Tudur Trevor, King of Gloucester, and Angharad, daughter of Howel Dda, King of Wales.

The SVH-3 helicopter was built and designed in Argentina by Augusto Cicare in 1994 at his home in Saladillo, three hours south of Buenos Aires. A helicopter inventor and designer from 1948 onwards (he started using magazines as inspiration and worked by trial and error). After designing many helicopters including the Angel, and designing part of the Lamborghini sports car, he developed the single seat SVH-3 helicopter simulator to teach his eldest son Fernando to fly.

That two such differing elements should come together was the work of Gary McCormack and his company ME2, who with Tomorrow's World organised a competition in 2000 to get a complete novice flying a helicopter in a minimum number of hours, which was filmed at Brynkinalt. Recently, however, the only person with a SVH-3 in Europe seems to be David Kay in...