I guess you are only including recent air force birds, as there isnt a Sea Fury or Mustang (thunder or otherwise). given the selection, I'd go for an A4, with the sound following it along the flightline!
If it was supposed to be easy. everyone would be doing it...
Post by Dave Homewood on Nov 14, 2006 21:27:39 GMT 12
I voted Skyhawk as there's nothing quite like a low and and fast A-4K. The best display I saw was not at an airshow but in fact at Woodbourne in 1989 when 75 Squadron returned from Australia after some deployment (maybe to Asia?) and for whatever reason (weather maybe) they staged through Woody Valley for the night. We watched them leave next day and of course as all the techies were out on the apron watching, they put on a show for us, very very low indeed! I have a bad photo somewhere showing the grass on the other sdie of the runway top of frame, runway middle, and grass this side of airstrip bottom. A blurry grass-cutting Skyhawk is in that lower region of frame, doing a very fast run. So low, Ray Hanna would have cringed!
Post by Dave Homewood on Nov 14, 2006 21:31:39 GMT 12
I forgot to add that as well as the Skyhawk, there's nothing quite like the sound and boneshaking feeling of a Hercules low, hard and fast overhead. You know, when you're close to the display line in a place like Ardmore or Wanaka, and the vibration makes your eyeballs shake! Awesome.
Best airshow low buzz for me was an Andover at Wigram during Wings and Wheels 1993 - me and another chap were tasked with driving out to the runway on the powerpull and retrieving the chutes he just dropped so he could land. The cheeky bugger saw us in the big wide open green and buzzed us very low and fast. That, I have to saw, was a "Cadillac of the Skies" moment for us! Awesome
Best airshow low buzz for me was an Andover at Wigram during Wings and Wheels 1993 - me and another chap were tasked with driving out to the runway on the powerpull and retrieving the chutes he just dropped so he could land. The cheeky bugger saw us in the big wide open green and buzzed us very low and fast. That, I have to saw, was a "Cadillac of the Skies" moment for us! Awesome
Oops, I forgot about the Andover, can't say in all of the airshows I've been to I remember them doing a low altitude high speed run, it's alway been more of a display of the wicked manouverability of it.
We only borrow for a while, we don't keep - RNZAF Strike Force
The best skyhawk run I remember was Taupo, 2000 I think(or was it 2001) when a pair of A4s came up from Ohakea. they crossed the lake at zilch feet and noone at the show saw them, then suddenly popped up over the manuka scrub (the airfiled sits on a plateau a hundred or so feet above the lake, with scrub blocking the view of the arrival direction) going like the clappers. the doppler effect meant there was no warning at all, just sudden noise and movement. After agreat display they departed back over the lake at low altitude, you could see them disappearing off and regaining height over Turangi.
If it was supposed to be easy. everyone would be doing it...
Ok I have put my dibs in for the mighty 727 (vomit comet) particly for a few passes he did at Whenuapai in around 1990. I was with a few others , doing an engine run on an Orion at the time when i saw this 727 come in real low , not too fast then back away across the golf course. Lots of people commented on how close the wing dropped to the ground. After contacting fellow S&S guys on 40 Sqn, found out he was doing another practise the next day, so this time I got into abetter position to witness it. Word had now got around that this was quite a bit of a show and quite a lot of base personnel we out for a look. Pretty sure this was his last Display at an air show before getting out. Timaru was the place for the actual flyby. So Ok he did this next practise and the crowd were agasp with how low he went, especially when banking away with the wing tip seemingly just metres from the ground. John cotton was his name Have afew photos of it, and this being my first time at sending a photo, will see how it works
