Post by Dave Homewood on Apr 13, 2011 4:20:18 GMT 12
It's really amazing to think that exactly two years has already gone past since my favourite airshow, Classic Fighters at Omaka in 2009. As we approach the next show in less than two weeks i thought it would be worth a look back at the last of these excellent and unique airshows, held at Omaka, Blenheim.
I was not going to go, I did not have the money to, and was resigned to the fact that i would not get there, and would have to be content with looking at other people's photos on the forum. So it still seems extraordinary to me that when I mentioned this fact on the forum it was the catalyst for a campaign that was started and grew in momentum called the "save The Dave" Campaign. The freinds on the forum rallied around and within days of the show it was all organised - Al marshall had been kind enough to organise me a ticket there and back on Air New Zealand flights; Gavin Conroy kindly organised me a three day media pass; John Saunders was good enough to offer me a place to stay during the airshow, in his hangar; and a benefactor who still remains a mystery to me but to whom I am eternally grateful very kindly paid the remaining cost of the airline ticket. So in the space of a few days of mentioning that I could not make it to the show, amazingly I was there.
It was like a fairytale story, and I have to admit that it was definately like going to a wonderland. I had been to the airshow in 2007 - my first time - and I had thoroughly enjoyed it. The excellent flying, the great selection of aircraft types, the closeness of the flightlines and the happy, exciting atmosphere that only Omaka seems to generate so well during an airshow. Plus lots of great friends from the forum and the aviation community. So armed with my memories of 2007 I hoped I'd have as good a time in 2009. I did, and then some.
Staying with John was excellent, we got on like a house on fire and he had some other very interesting guests from the aviation world also staying there, from the USA, Australia, Switzerland via Wanaka, and my friend Dave Phillips and his son from Clevedon too. The hangar provided the perfect base as you wake up in the morning, step outside and you're at the airshow. In the early hours as the sun is just rising the activity is already beginning, long before the crowds throng in. This is the time I really love. That unique golden light of the Marlborough sunrise as it catches the dust begiinning to rise as the planes are wheeled out onto the frosty grass. Magic. And they're not just any old aeroplanes, the collection of WWI types are a staggering aray of early technology, combined with beauty and artistic flare. I had seen the incredible sight of the seven Fokker Triplanes in 2007, something I am so very much looking forward to again this year. But in 2009 the mix was different, there was a much more British mix to the WWI attendees. An unbelievable sight of three SE-5a replicas, so exact in their craftsmanship that even Biggles himself wouldn't notice they were 21st Century reproductions, was magnificent.
Stunning too was the original and very recently returned to the air Be-2. I found that fascinating as my earliest and one of my very few influences of WWI aviation before attending the 2007 and 2009 Classic Fighters shows, and the Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre, was the old BBC TV series "Wings" in which a great deal of the flying was done in Be-2c's. They were actually replicas and models in the series, not that I knew then. Seeing an absolutely genuine one reborn and flying in that early morning sun was something that really was something to remember.
But the WWI type that really did it for me was in fact the genuine Avro 504K, which was actually built in 1925 and was one of the most superb restorations I have ever seen. It looked great from every angle. It siunded great, it even smelled wonderful. And it just exudes history, having been flown by most of New Zealand's and a few of Australia's most famous aviatiors of the 1920's and 1930's, and then been rebuilt by some of NZ's most reverred restorers, and owned by our greatest ever film maker, what an amazing artifact it truly is.
Having the opportunity to see these very rare types in the air is exactly what Classic Fighters is all about. The show I think sets itself apart from others in New Zealand by bringing their audiences so many new types to the airshow scene, and so many interesting combinations and scenarios. The WWI air battles are just magnificent to watch. They are low, tight, close, and the sky is literally full of fighters darting about, jinking here and there as the Allies fight the Germans. Smoke will poor from a plane and it will "go down". safely landing so he hugely experienced pilot who's been flying it can jump out, run to another rare and interesting type, take off in it and continue the fight!
As well as WWI aircraft debuts, Classic fighters has had its share of other debuts too. One of the most anticipated and most appreciated from 2009 was that of the Spitfire Mk IX owned by Brendan Deere and his family. Throughout the weekend we were treated to dislays in this by both John Lanham and Keith Skilling, each more memorable than the last. For me the ultimate however, the best Spitfire performance I've ever seen in fact, was the sunset flight by Keith as the opening to the twilight show. It still sends chills thinking about it. I was standing in the aircraft park and looked up to see the Spitfire coming down hard and fast directly at me out of the golden sky above as he lined up for the first low pass. I'd never seen one from that angle, it was both exhiliarting and frightening. I'd have hated to be on the receining end if it had had its guns and canons blazing, as I'd have been square in the sights I think.
The twilight show was breathtaking. Not just the Spitfire but also in particular the Red Checkers. They had been the best team I'd seen ever that year. I have seen many Red Checkers displays over the years, almost hundreds in fact, but seeing the 2009 team at Whenuapai and then omaka had convinced me this was it, the best team so far. That was in the daytime. In the twilight show they then did somethjing I never imagined could happen, they flew their full routine in darkness with their lights on! It was not pitch black, the sky to the west still had an orange glow but the sky to the east had a distintively dark blue hue - this in itself must have been a bit disorientating as they flew the routine with the sky changing colour constantly. Yet they kept it tight, and flew it perfectly. I was aghast. Will we ever see the likes again i wonder of such a performance and such a great team?
Another highlight of this show for me was the Italian theme, which meant a fair bit of historical and theatrical element was woven through the programme. The Stuka replica donned Italian colours. There were Vespas spewing forth from the belching firey Bristol Freighter, which in itself was a great highlight of the show, there were gondola races which showed great imagination combined with hysterical silliness, and there was some very well planned and conducted WWIi re-enactment. It was very novel to have the Spitfire involved in the ground battle to the point where the pilot was forced to land and captured.
The German 88mm gun was just incredible to see and hear firing - you read about them, you see them in the old b&w films, you get told about them by the veterans, but seeing a genuine one actually being handled and fired by a competently trained crew is just something else again. What most of the public never saw was the amazing effort by engineers to repair that gun the day before after a mishap, welding and working away into darkness to get it ready. I am so grateful to whoever came up with the idea of bringing it to the show, and to those who reapired it, crewed it and demonstrated it. It was amazing to see.
The big finale of the 2009 show was a re-enactment both by air and ground forces of the bombardment of the monestary at Monte cassino, Italy in 1944. For this to happen the dedicated team of airshow workers had built a huge ediface on the Wither Hills to replicate the famous doomed monestary. At the time watching the attacks of wave after wave of warbirds running in on the monestary dropping mock bombs and watching the explosions it made a fantastic spectacle, a great show and the excellent commentary provided a good historical context. I didn't know a great deal about the Cassino battles then. Since then I have filmed interviews with many veterans who were there, in the Infantry, the Artillery, the Armorured Regt, etc. Their chilling descriptions of the battle to take that town still haunt me, I have a much greater understanding of what went on, and a HUGE respect for those soldiers who did what they did in that awful campaign. looking back now armed with all this extra knowledge i have to really congratulate the organisers for putting on such an excellent dsiplay that in the circumstances did a very, very good job to recreate an important historical chapter. With the news that has leaked out that there's a full sized V-2 german rocket there this year we can only imagine what sort of amazing spectacle we're going to see there this year.
At the end of each day the Marlborough Aero Club bar always provided a comforting welcome, some good food, great beer and wonderful company, just as it had in 2007 too. Even though flying is over for the day, walking in here is such a great feeling. There you are shoulder to shoulder with the absolute greats of airshow display flying, in this country and the world. And there are many of the locals who've poured months of hard work and their hearts and soles into the event, often still working hard to feed us punters and quench our thirsts with friendly smiles. There are visitors there from all over New Zealand, and all over the world. There are re-enactors, vehicle owners, stall holders, people staying in the tent city, and folk from all spectrums of the avaition world and the airshow scene. Many, many of them I now know through the forum, so I have the advantage of meeting so many friends and contacts there. That club room bar, packed to the gunnels and bristling with excitement and chatter about the thrills seen that day, or what's happening tomorrow, is for me a wonderful, vibrant slice of the airshow. It's just very special indeed. As the sun sets, and the last vestiges of that extra clear air they seem to have there grows dark, as the ever swirling dust finally begins to settle for another night, make you way to the MAC bar for a bevvie and a yarn, you will not regret it.
And so, to me, is Classic Fighters. it really is a very special airshow in a very special place, with very special people. It's a hub of historic aviation which is continuing to grow and grow. So much is going on there in the restoration workshops and at the Aviation Heritage Centre, and the bi-annual pilgrimage that we make to this Mecca of aviation to see the Omaka folk showing off their talents is such a special weekend.
If you've not been before, I cannot recommend this airshow enough. 2011 promises to be even better again, with seve Fokker Triplanes, two Spitfires, hopefully the new Yak 3 and FW190, the P-40C alongside I guess the other two P-40's, the Sopwith Triplane, the V-2 rocket and lots, lots more.
I have enjoyed revisiting my last Omaka airshow visit here, i hope you ahve too. Now roll on the next one.
Here's some of my photos from 2009:
On Sunday morning there was a neat fog draped across the grapes behind the airfiield making a neat backdrop to a few photos.
Happy Memories...
I was not going to go, I did not have the money to, and was resigned to the fact that i would not get there, and would have to be content with looking at other people's photos on the forum. So it still seems extraordinary to me that when I mentioned this fact on the forum it was the catalyst for a campaign that was started and grew in momentum called the "save The Dave" Campaign. The freinds on the forum rallied around and within days of the show it was all organised - Al marshall had been kind enough to organise me a ticket there and back on Air New Zealand flights; Gavin Conroy kindly organised me a three day media pass; John Saunders was good enough to offer me a place to stay during the airshow, in his hangar; and a benefactor who still remains a mystery to me but to whom I am eternally grateful very kindly paid the remaining cost of the airline ticket. So in the space of a few days of mentioning that I could not make it to the show, amazingly I was there.
It was like a fairytale story, and I have to admit that it was definately like going to a wonderland. I had been to the airshow in 2007 - my first time - and I had thoroughly enjoyed it. The excellent flying, the great selection of aircraft types, the closeness of the flightlines and the happy, exciting atmosphere that only Omaka seems to generate so well during an airshow. Plus lots of great friends from the forum and the aviation community. So armed with my memories of 2007 I hoped I'd have as good a time in 2009. I did, and then some.
Staying with John was excellent, we got on like a house on fire and he had some other very interesting guests from the aviation world also staying there, from the USA, Australia, Switzerland via Wanaka, and my friend Dave Phillips and his son from Clevedon too. The hangar provided the perfect base as you wake up in the morning, step outside and you're at the airshow. In the early hours as the sun is just rising the activity is already beginning, long before the crowds throng in. This is the time I really love. That unique golden light of the Marlborough sunrise as it catches the dust begiinning to rise as the planes are wheeled out onto the frosty grass. Magic. And they're not just any old aeroplanes, the collection of WWI types are a staggering aray of early technology, combined with beauty and artistic flare. I had seen the incredible sight of the seven Fokker Triplanes in 2007, something I am so very much looking forward to again this year. But in 2009 the mix was different, there was a much more British mix to the WWI attendees. An unbelievable sight of three SE-5a replicas, so exact in their craftsmanship that even Biggles himself wouldn't notice they were 21st Century reproductions, was magnificent.
Stunning too was the original and very recently returned to the air Be-2. I found that fascinating as my earliest and one of my very few influences of WWI aviation before attending the 2007 and 2009 Classic Fighters shows, and the Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre, was the old BBC TV series "Wings" in which a great deal of the flying was done in Be-2c's. They were actually replicas and models in the series, not that I knew then. Seeing an absolutely genuine one reborn and flying in that early morning sun was something that really was something to remember.
But the WWI type that really did it for me was in fact the genuine Avro 504K, which was actually built in 1925 and was one of the most superb restorations I have ever seen. It looked great from every angle. It siunded great, it even smelled wonderful. And it just exudes history, having been flown by most of New Zealand's and a few of Australia's most famous aviatiors of the 1920's and 1930's, and then been rebuilt by some of NZ's most reverred restorers, and owned by our greatest ever film maker, what an amazing artifact it truly is.
Having the opportunity to see these very rare types in the air is exactly what Classic Fighters is all about. The show I think sets itself apart from others in New Zealand by bringing their audiences so many new types to the airshow scene, and so many interesting combinations and scenarios. The WWI air battles are just magnificent to watch. They are low, tight, close, and the sky is literally full of fighters darting about, jinking here and there as the Allies fight the Germans. Smoke will poor from a plane and it will "go down". safely landing so he hugely experienced pilot who's been flying it can jump out, run to another rare and interesting type, take off in it and continue the fight!
As well as WWI aircraft debuts, Classic fighters has had its share of other debuts too. One of the most anticipated and most appreciated from 2009 was that of the Spitfire Mk IX owned by Brendan Deere and his family. Throughout the weekend we were treated to dislays in this by both John Lanham and Keith Skilling, each more memorable than the last. For me the ultimate however, the best Spitfire performance I've ever seen in fact, was the sunset flight by Keith as the opening to the twilight show. It still sends chills thinking about it. I was standing in the aircraft park and looked up to see the Spitfire coming down hard and fast directly at me out of the golden sky above as he lined up for the first low pass. I'd never seen one from that angle, it was both exhiliarting and frightening. I'd have hated to be on the receining end if it had had its guns and canons blazing, as I'd have been square in the sights I think.
The twilight show was breathtaking. Not just the Spitfire but also in particular the Red Checkers. They had been the best team I'd seen ever that year. I have seen many Red Checkers displays over the years, almost hundreds in fact, but seeing the 2009 team at Whenuapai and then omaka had convinced me this was it, the best team so far. That was in the daytime. In the twilight show they then did somethjing I never imagined could happen, they flew their full routine in darkness with their lights on! It was not pitch black, the sky to the west still had an orange glow but the sky to the east had a distintively dark blue hue - this in itself must have been a bit disorientating as they flew the routine with the sky changing colour constantly. Yet they kept it tight, and flew it perfectly. I was aghast. Will we ever see the likes again i wonder of such a performance and such a great team?
Another highlight of this show for me was the Italian theme, which meant a fair bit of historical and theatrical element was woven through the programme. The Stuka replica donned Italian colours. There were Vespas spewing forth from the belching firey Bristol Freighter, which in itself was a great highlight of the show, there were gondola races which showed great imagination combined with hysterical silliness, and there was some very well planned and conducted WWIi re-enactment. It was very novel to have the Spitfire involved in the ground battle to the point where the pilot was forced to land and captured.
The German 88mm gun was just incredible to see and hear firing - you read about them, you see them in the old b&w films, you get told about them by the veterans, but seeing a genuine one actually being handled and fired by a competently trained crew is just something else again. What most of the public never saw was the amazing effort by engineers to repair that gun the day before after a mishap, welding and working away into darkness to get it ready. I am so grateful to whoever came up with the idea of bringing it to the show, and to those who reapired it, crewed it and demonstrated it. It was amazing to see.
The big finale of the 2009 show was a re-enactment both by air and ground forces of the bombardment of the monestary at Monte cassino, Italy in 1944. For this to happen the dedicated team of airshow workers had built a huge ediface on the Wither Hills to replicate the famous doomed monestary. At the time watching the attacks of wave after wave of warbirds running in on the monestary dropping mock bombs and watching the explosions it made a fantastic spectacle, a great show and the excellent commentary provided a good historical context. I didn't know a great deal about the Cassino battles then. Since then I have filmed interviews with many veterans who were there, in the Infantry, the Artillery, the Armorured Regt, etc. Their chilling descriptions of the battle to take that town still haunt me, I have a much greater understanding of what went on, and a HUGE respect for those soldiers who did what they did in that awful campaign. looking back now armed with all this extra knowledge i have to really congratulate the organisers for putting on such an excellent dsiplay that in the circumstances did a very, very good job to recreate an important historical chapter. With the news that has leaked out that there's a full sized V-2 german rocket there this year we can only imagine what sort of amazing spectacle we're going to see there this year.
At the end of each day the Marlborough Aero Club bar always provided a comforting welcome, some good food, great beer and wonderful company, just as it had in 2007 too. Even though flying is over for the day, walking in here is such a great feeling. There you are shoulder to shoulder with the absolute greats of airshow display flying, in this country and the world. And there are many of the locals who've poured months of hard work and their hearts and soles into the event, often still working hard to feed us punters and quench our thirsts with friendly smiles. There are visitors there from all over New Zealand, and all over the world. There are re-enactors, vehicle owners, stall holders, people staying in the tent city, and folk from all spectrums of the avaition world and the airshow scene. Many, many of them I now know through the forum, so I have the advantage of meeting so many friends and contacts there. That club room bar, packed to the gunnels and bristling with excitement and chatter about the thrills seen that day, or what's happening tomorrow, is for me a wonderful, vibrant slice of the airshow. It's just very special indeed. As the sun sets, and the last vestiges of that extra clear air they seem to have there grows dark, as the ever swirling dust finally begins to settle for another night, make you way to the MAC bar for a bevvie and a yarn, you will not regret it.
And so, to me, is Classic Fighters. it really is a very special airshow in a very special place, with very special people. It's a hub of historic aviation which is continuing to grow and grow. So much is going on there in the restoration workshops and at the Aviation Heritage Centre, and the bi-annual pilgrimage that we make to this Mecca of aviation to see the Omaka folk showing off their talents is such a special weekend.
If you've not been before, I cannot recommend this airshow enough. 2011 promises to be even better again, with seve Fokker Triplanes, two Spitfires, hopefully the new Yak 3 and FW190, the P-40C alongside I guess the other two P-40's, the Sopwith Triplane, the V-2 rocket and lots, lots more.
I have enjoyed revisiting my last Omaka airshow visit here, i hope you ahve too. Now roll on the next one.
Here's some of my photos from 2009:
On Sunday morning there was a neat fog draped across the grapes behind the airfiield making a neat backdrop to a few photos.
Happy Memories...
It is looking very good though over the whole country, which is good news for me since I have to be able to make it VFR from Ardmore!
