Odds and sods...

Here are a few of the remaining images from the Wings Over Wairarapa airshow. I have a lot more, and might put of few of them on the site now and then. If you want details on any of these aircraft, you may like to check out www.wikipedia.com.

Top to bottom are:

Boeing Stearman
Beech Staggerwing
Grumman Agcat
Pitts Special
Edge 540

Back to the Great War

Here are some aircraft from the Great War. Never mind that they are replicas of the originals, as the look, perform, sound just like the originals [engines included]. Given that the originals of these aircraft were designed and flying within 15 or so years of the first powered flight [Wright brothers or Richard Pearce is not an argument I want to get in to!] makes these machine even more incredible!

The pilots of these machines put on a great display of mock dogfighting, and generally showing their aircraft off to best advantage.

Top to bottom are:

Sopwith Camel
Fokker DR 152
Fokker D.V11
Avro 504K

RNZAF, vol. 2

Here's the second set from the RNZAF, this time of an Air Force C130H Hercules during its display. The low level shot was near the end of a very impressive run down the runway, at exactly that height, and [I think I remember this right] at around 130 knots. The last shot is of one of the RNZAF's Kiwi Blue parachute team. This team consists of RNZAF parachute instructors... I still think that you've got to be nuts to jump out of a perfectly good aircraft...

RNZAF, vol. 1

The Royal New Zealand Air Force always put on a fantastic show for the crowds, and this year was no exception. I've been privillaged to see these people perform at Warbirds Over Wanaka, during practice day for an airshow at Ardmore a couple of years back, and now at Wings over Wairarapa. Here are 2 pictures of Kiwi Checkers in their CT4/E Airtrainers peforming formation aeros and two of a UH1 during it's lower, slower, but still impressive, piece. Awesome!

Tigers on the prowl...

It would not be an airshow without a few de Havilland DH82A Tiger Moths around. These [seemingly] ancient aircraft have a long connection with New Zealand, not only having training thousands of pilots but also being at the very start of New Zealand's aerial topdressing activities.

Two items of note during the Tiger displays were the ribbon cutting where one aircraft chases the other and tries to cut one of the ribbons attached to the lead aircraft. The other was the mass takeoff and flypast of 6 Tigers. See below.

Something a little different

Here are pictures of some distinctly civil aircraft at the airshow. As promised in my last post, I've included what must be the ugliest aircraft in existance [surely not even it's designer could love this one!]!

First is the ugly one. ZK-AMW is an Aeronautical Corp Aeronca 100 Ultralight. Its engine is a massive 36hp [wow!]. Apparantly it still holds the record for the lowest powered aircraft to cross Africa. You could probably run faster :-) Oh yeah - that ugly thing sticking up is part of the aircraft. Having said all that, it would probably be fun to fly anyway!

Anyway, the rest of them are:

EDR is a Jodel D.11
EEF is a Gardan GY-20 Minicab Ultralight
PKT is an Alpi Aviation Pioneer 200
NDI is an Airborne Outback trike

Polikarpov I-153 "Chaika"

A certain star of the show was this Polikarpov I-153 "Chaika" ["Seagull"], a WW2 era Russian creation.

It's ugly [though not the most ugly - there's a worse aircraft coming in a later post], extremely noisy and has a rather less than impressive fuel endurance [it was shipped to Masterton in a crate...], but apart from those issues, it's a fantastic aircraft to watch [and listen to]. This was also the first time the aircraft had been seen in the North Island.

The Albatross and the Vampires

Two of the crowd favourites [of what I suspect were many favourites :-)] were the two De Havilland DH 115 Vampires and the L39 Albatross. Both of these types looked great in the air, both during their individual performances and also flying as a single formation.

The L39 flew with various Eastern Bloc forces and the Vampires flew with a number of Western forces, including New Zealand. In New Zealand, the Vampires preceeded the A4 Skyhawks.

Tigers Blood!

Tigers Blood is a stunning example of a Thunder Mustang, a 3/4 scale replica of the original P51Mustang! This one is owned by a syndicate based in Auckland and is seen here at the Wings Over Wairarapa airshow last Saturday.

I would have like more photos of it flying, but I only got one clean and crisp one - the rest were blurred.

I strongly suggest you visit the syndicate's official website (www.kiwithunder.com) for all the details on this awesome machine.

Off to the Airshow

We had to be into Masterton / Hood AD before 10am, so we met at the Wellington Aero Club around 8am to get organised.
While we were waiting and organising a Percival Proctor V vintage aircraft arrived, picked up a couple of passengers and left. Shortly after that, I was in the back of a C172N and off to Masterton [about a 30 minute flight]. Below are two photos of the Percival Procter, one out the back of the C172 of Wellington International Airport just after takeoff and downwind at Masterton prior to landing [oops - there's a load of reflection in this photo!].

Wings Over Wairarapa!! Fantastic!

I went to the Wings Over Wairarapa today and it was AWESOME!

I came away with almost 200 pictures from the day, of which I have kept just under 180 so far. Over the next few weeks, you can expect to see some of these pop up in this blog. I'll trde y and arrange them in topics which may make sense, but that in itself will take time.

Meanwhile here are a few samplers from throughout the day. They are, from top to bottom [apologies if I get a description or two wrong!]:

Fokker D.VII [World War One era -thanks Whitehawk!]
Two North American Harvards taking off
Polikarpov I-153 "Chaika" [Russian WWII fighter]
Two P40 Kittihawks and a Vought F4U Corsair
de Havilland Vampire

Wellington Weather!

Here is a video of a B737 taking off from Wellington yeaterday evening, and disappearing into the cloud at approximately 3-400 feet. Enjoy!

Wellington Weather!

Wellington had the coldest December for many decades, something that even the locals were complaining about. So, come January, we were hoping for some better weather.

A couple of days ago, I thought that it had arrived, with an absolutely gorgeous day - hardly any cloud, barely a breath of wind, and the airport reporting 18 degrees at around 10:30pm (yeah - it was hot!).

Needless to say, with weather like that it was bound to change, and it has. Last night I spent the evening listening to the sound of aircraft executing missed approaches and diverting to other aerodromes. It is kinda weird being able to hear a B737 going around somewhere up there, but not being able to see them!

This morning, the fog is even worse. Wellington Airport is reporting the following on the ATIS [Aerodrome Terminal Information Service]:

wellington information bravo
issued at 1818
expect ils/dme approach
runway 16
runway conditions damp
conditions below circling for all aircraft
surface wind 190 deg 7 knots
visibility 400 meters
present weather fog
cloud overcast 100 feet
temperature 14
dew point 13
qnh 1015
reported 2000' wind 360 deg 02 knots
on first contact with wellington tower or control notify receipt of bravo

Needless to say,there is NOTHING happening here...

Cessna A185F at Welllington

This is a Cessna A185F [registration ZK-PRM], just after takeoff at Wellington a few days ago. Note the cargo pod under the fuselage. These aircraft have a [well earned] reputation for being very capable machines, able to get a decent load [people and their gear] in and out of small, rough strips and also flying at a good speed. Nice!