- 5,080
- Panama City, FL
My pictures from the 2009 Blue Angels Homecoming air show, November 13 and 14. I rode over Friday morning and attended the day show, only to discover that the night show had been moved to Saturday, and I didn't get the memo. I wasn't going to return, but the weather Saturday was perfect, the missus was at work, so I had nothing better to do as it turns out. So I left home a bit after 12:30 and rode west a couple hours again to see the night show.
Still camera is a Nikon D50 with Nikon's 55-200 f/5.6 zoom. I shot the day show at 200 speed, and the night at 1600 to try to keep a usable shutter speed. Video camera is a Sony DCR-TRV120, a 9-year-old Digital-8 camera. (When I bought it the choice was Digital-8 or Mini-DV, and I had a Hi8 library that the Digital-8 camera could play. I get flak from ignorant savages about using Digital-8 instead of Mini-DV, but the recording standard is the same in both formats. Don't have HD yet, mostly because they're not free.)
They parked me a little over a mile from the flight line when I arrived the second day. I asked the Marine if I couldn't do better with my being on a bike, but he said that with the day show ending, traffic setup out of the show was already in place and I couldn't get any closer. So not only a ride, but a hike.
I arrive late enough on Friday to miss just a couple of acts, Skip Stewart in his Prometheus biplane and Pattry Wagstaff in her Extra. The skydivers were jumping in with the flag when I arrived.
First pics are the Geico Skytypers, flying SNJs, the Navy version of the T-6 Texan trainer. If you were a Naval aviator and joined before the dawn of recorded history, you may have learned to fly in one of these. The Skytypers advertising mission is to fly 6 aircraft, 5 abreast with one controller, and they release smoke in computer-timed spurts, making themselves a giant dot-matrix printer in the sky. They also fly a formation airshow as seen here.
There was an F-16 demonstration which took place during my much-needed port-a-potty visit, and afterwards they had the Air Force Heritage Flight, the F-16 and a P-47 Thunderbolt from the Lone Star Flight Museum in Galveston, Texas.
Next up was the show "Ten Sticks of Dynamite," with Skip Stewart, Patty Wagstaff, Kent Shockley in his Shockwave jet truck, and fuel bombs on the field.
Prometheus:
and Patty Wagstaff:
Next up were the Aerostars, flying Russian-built YAK-52 aerobatic trainers. These guys fly the tightest formations I've seen in a piston-engine team.
Another little irony I found is that when the skydive team was bringing in the U.S. flag they were being circled by three aircraft making a big spiral smoke pattern in the sky surrounding the jumper with the flag. This is the team that did that. Russian-built trainers now used to render honors to the U.S. flag as it arrives at an air show. Cool.
Next up, Fat albert. They did one of the few JATO shots they're able to do this year, but I was shooting video. No pics of that this time.
Then the Blues themselves. What's the smallest space four aircraft can take up?
Dirty loop:
Double Farvel, 1 and 4 inverted:
Echelon right:
They also do a 5-ship line abreast loop:
Delta roll, all 6 aircraft:
A couple of yanking and banking shots. Because you have to:
Now for Saturday's twilight/night show. The sun is very low as the show starts, but it's still light out.
Skip Stewart and Prometheus:
Patty Wagstaff and her inverted ribbon cut. She had to do it the opposite direction from normal because in the planned direction, she was facing straight into the sun and couldn't see the ribbon, poles, people, runway, whatever.
This is what she was looking at going the other direction. Nice, but not good when you have to see something between yourself and that light.
Skydivers came next, and their starting altitude had them still in full sunlight, even though it had just disappeared from view at ground level:
Aerostar team circling the flag-bearing skydiver:
The Aerostar planes had rear-facing landing lights to illuminate the smoke. It mostly made for a rocket-type appearance. And that is what color the sky was, looking northeast!
"Bandits" rolling in for the next pass:
Really getting dark, now, a sea of blue field lights:
What better performer now than the Shockwave jet truck! He made a circle puffing smoke, and disappeared. At first I was thinking, "Well, that was dumb! We can't see anything now!" Then he lit up the jets from inside the cloud:
and eventually emerged. none of these shots are at speed; he's just puffing the exhaust with fuel to make a pretty fire:
The rest of what I have is on video. Took forever to get it cut; I've changed my PC out and Premiere is giving me fits.
There was no night JATO this time. I guess they wasted the last bottles on the day show.
As I was riding home, heading east, There came a point where I noticed the constellation Orion rising ahead of me. As the trip progressed, Orion got higher in the sky, and it made me feel that I was getting closer to it!
Video links:
Highlights of the show prior to the Blue Angels segment. Includes the Skytypers, Aerostars, Heritage Flight, and Ten Sticks of Dynamite.
Fat Albert JATO, and the Blues themselves.
Twilight/night show.
Still camera is a Nikon D50 with Nikon's 55-200 f/5.6 zoom. I shot the day show at 200 speed, and the night at 1600 to try to keep a usable shutter speed. Video camera is a Sony DCR-TRV120, a 9-year-old Digital-8 camera. (When I bought it the choice was Digital-8 or Mini-DV, and I had a Hi8 library that the Digital-8 camera could play. I get flak from ignorant savages about using Digital-8 instead of Mini-DV, but the recording standard is the same in both formats. Don't have HD yet, mostly because they're not free.)
They parked me a little over a mile from the flight line when I arrived the second day. I asked the Marine if I couldn't do better with my being on a bike, but he said that with the day show ending, traffic setup out of the show was already in place and I couldn't get any closer. So not only a ride, but a hike.
I arrive late enough on Friday to miss just a couple of acts, Skip Stewart in his Prometheus biplane and Pattry Wagstaff in her Extra. The skydivers were jumping in with the flag when I arrived.
First pics are the Geico Skytypers, flying SNJs, the Navy version of the T-6 Texan trainer. If you were a Naval aviator and joined before the dawn of recorded history, you may have learned to fly in one of these. The Skytypers advertising mission is to fly 6 aircraft, 5 abreast with one controller, and they release smoke in computer-timed spurts, making themselves a giant dot-matrix printer in the sky. They also fly a formation airshow as seen here.
There was an F-16 demonstration which took place during my much-needed port-a-potty visit, and afterwards they had the Air Force Heritage Flight, the F-16 and a P-47 Thunderbolt from the Lone Star Flight Museum in Galveston, Texas.
Next up was the show "Ten Sticks of Dynamite," with Skip Stewart, Patty Wagstaff, Kent Shockley in his Shockwave jet truck, and fuel bombs on the field.
Prometheus:
and Patty Wagstaff:
Next up were the Aerostars, flying Russian-built YAK-52 aerobatic trainers. These guys fly the tightest formations I've seen in a piston-engine team.
Another little irony I found is that when the skydive team was bringing in the U.S. flag they were being circled by three aircraft making a big spiral smoke pattern in the sky surrounding the jumper with the flag. This is the team that did that. Russian-built trainers now used to render honors to the U.S. flag as it arrives at an air show. Cool.
Next up, Fat albert. They did one of the few JATO shots they're able to do this year, but I was shooting video. No pics of that this time.
Then the Blues themselves. What's the smallest space four aircraft can take up?
Dirty loop:
Double Farvel, 1 and 4 inverted:
Echelon right:
They also do a 5-ship line abreast loop:
Delta roll, all 6 aircraft:
A couple of yanking and banking shots. Because you have to:
Now for Saturday's twilight/night show. The sun is very low as the show starts, but it's still light out.
Skip Stewart and Prometheus:
Patty Wagstaff and her inverted ribbon cut. She had to do it the opposite direction from normal because in the planned direction, she was facing straight into the sun and couldn't see the ribbon, poles, people, runway, whatever.
This is what she was looking at going the other direction. Nice, but not good when you have to see something between yourself and that light.
Skydivers came next, and their starting altitude had them still in full sunlight, even though it had just disappeared from view at ground level:
Aerostar team circling the flag-bearing skydiver:
The Aerostar planes had rear-facing landing lights to illuminate the smoke. It mostly made for a rocket-type appearance. And that is what color the sky was, looking northeast!
"Bandits" rolling in for the next pass:
Really getting dark, now, a sea of blue field lights:
What better performer now than the Shockwave jet truck! He made a circle puffing smoke, and disappeared. At first I was thinking, "Well, that was dumb! We can't see anything now!" Then he lit up the jets from inside the cloud:
and eventually emerged. none of these shots are at speed; he's just puffing the exhaust with fuel to make a pretty fire:
The rest of what I have is on video. Took forever to get it cut; I've changed my PC out and Premiere is giving me fits.
There was no night JATO this time. I guess they wasted the last bottles on the day show.
As I was riding home, heading east, There came a point where I noticed the constellation Orion rising ahead of me. As the trip progressed, Orion got higher in the sky, and it made me feel that I was getting closer to it!
Video links:
Highlights of the show prior to the Blue Angels segment. Includes the Skytypers, Aerostars, Heritage Flight, and Ten Sticks of Dynamite.
Fat Albert JATO, and the Blues themselves.
Twilight/night show.
Last edited:
The JATO bottles have been getting scarce as they're no longer made, and the ones they have are old enough to be possibly undependable. It's not like you can test them, either. The last two seasons JATO has been reserved for selected shows, and they will not be doing it any more after this year.
