McChord AFB Air Expo 2008 - Saturday and Sunday

The airshow proved to be another world class event. The organizers put on a fantastic airshow featuring a wide diversity of acts and everything semed to flow very smoothly.

Here are some pics from the actual airshow:

Team McChord. McChord AFB is home to two squadrons of C-17 Globemaster III's

This C-17 just emerges from the low clouds on Saturdays airshow

The B-2 Spirit only flew by on Saturday

Tora! Tora! Tora! taxis out to the runway to begin their 20 minute show.

The sky was full of these amazing warbirds, smoke, and giant fireballs as the airplanes simulated the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The F-18F Super Hornet pulls sharply into the vertical

Rhino high speed pass.

The F-15 creating some beautiful vapor as it climbs into the moist air.

F-15C Eagle

The Thunderbirds Diamond climbs high into the sky.

Knife Edge Pass

Thunderbird Six in full afterburner.

Enjoy!

Practice and Arrival: Friday, July 18th

One of the things I love most about airshows is the arrival and practice day. This is when you get a chance to see some more rare aircraft that will be on static display. Also the teams practice earlier in the week and provides many more opportunities to get great photographs.
Friday was no exception.

This is how my day began:

KC-10 Extender on very short final.

This C-5A Galaxy seemed to just stop in mid air. As the jet was overhead it was so close all I could see through the viewfinder were individual tires. At 50mm!! It felt like a hurricane after she passed over.


Eagle West turning sharply overhead.

This is where I was for landing. As you can see, I'm just a few hundred feet from where the jets were touching down. Try to imagine that C-5 Galaxy where this F-15 is.


Thunderbird number one coming in to land.

The F/A-18F Super Hornet doing the high speed pass.


This was one of two F/A-22 Raptors that flew in for the static display.

HH-65 Dolphin

P-51D Mustang

C-130J Herculese

A-10A Thunderbolt II, Warthog

C-12

T-38 Tallon

RC-135 Rivet Joint

F-16C Fighting Falcon

McChord AFB Air Expo 2008

If you've read previous posts, you know I was waiting a long time for this show. Unfortunately, at the last minute many changes were made to the show, some major. For example, the MiG Fury Fighters team that flys a MiG-15 and MiG-17 against a FJ-4 Fury canceled a week before the event due to fuel costs. Later all of the other warbird jets backed out as well. For a show that was going to be mainly a jet warbird show, it ended up not having ANY jet warbirds. :( Bummer. But maybe in 2010 it'll work out.

Also, the event brought in record crowds! On Saturday the record was broken as 150,000 people attended the airshow. The next day 227,000 people showed up!

The linuep included the US Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet demo, USAF F-15 Demo, USAF Thunderbirds, a B-2 Sprit flyby on Saturday, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Bud and Ross Granley, Tim Webber (I love your flying, but do you honestly have to sing about being high?), Air Force Reserve Jet Car, MiG-17 from Classic Aviation in Oregon, the C-17 single ship demo, Wings of Blue jump team, and the McChord Airfield assault with three C-17's.

Great show, everyone! There were no awkward pauses, except for the usual 45 minutes it takes the Thunderbirds to taxi out to the runway, twiddle their thumbs, then take off. But that's just how the Thunderbirds roll.

The next posts will feature photos from Fridays practice and arrival day, and the show on Saturday and Sunday, July 19th and 20th.

Blue Angels 2008 Calendar

I just finished work on my first 2008 calendar so far! Of course, being the Blue Angels fan that I am, this first installment features the 2007 US Navy Blue Angels!

If you're interested, please click here for a complete discription!

Tulip Festival Fly-In!

Skagit Regional Airport hosted the second biannial Tulip Festival Airshow and Fly-In on April 28th.

Quick Review:

In the weeks leading up to the show I was quite surprised to find they actually had the West Coast F/A-18C Hornet team on the schedule! Unfortunately the FAA wasn't able to grant them airspace clearance to do the full tactical demonstration, but the pilots took both ships up for some section (formation of two aircraft) flyby's and touch and goes.

As for military demonstrations, they also had a SAR helicopter (MH-60) from NAS Whidbey Island perform.

The show also featured Bud and Ross Granley, a father-son aerobatic team. One flys a Yak-55 and the other flys a Yak-18 and put on an incredible show!

Warbirds are always popular at smaller airshows such as this and they did provide a pretty good showing. There were four T-6 Texans (aka: SNJ, Harvard) two T-28's, and several other aircraft. There weren't any "big" showbirds out such as a P-51, but it was still a good lineup and provided some very crowded skys!

Photography:

The showline looks directly at the sun the entire time which means you're going to have a tricky time getting properly exposed pictures. Thanks to computer technology it is pretty easy to fix these issues.

Capturing good pictures of the static display, on the other hand, was pretty easy as there really weren't a lot of people around to ruin shots.

Overview:

Great show! Especially for this early in the season it's a great time to make sure you still know how to use your camera equipment after the long winter months. :) One of the greatest parts of this show was the chance to meet several friends in person for the first time! (You know who you are!)

More Pictures:

View my pictures of this show and order prints today!