Wings Over Wairarapa 2011: Post 15 - de Havilland Vampire

With the demise of the much anticipated de Havilland Venom [it had a landing accident the day before the airshow], it was left to the DH115 Mk.55 Trainer Vampire to represent the post-war British jet industry.

ZK-RVM is painted in RNZAF colours, although the registration NZ5712 was never worn by an RNZAF aircraft [the final Vampire has the military registration of NZ5711].

It was good to see this aircraft again, although I'm looking forward to seeing the Venom [hopefully in a couple of years at the next airshow]. On another note - I hear rumour that there might be an ex-RNZAF Strikemaster at the Classic Fighters airshow at Omaka over Easter this year. That would be awesome!

Europe Trip #15: RAF Museum Hendon - 10 - Jets!

For some reason jets fascinate me. I like the piston powered aircraft of course, but I guess jet powered aircraft are generally fast, sleek and rather noisy :-)

The list of fixed-wing turbine aircraft was less numerous than the others [naturally], but still very impressive. This post is the first of four for the jets. In this first post we have:

BAC Lightning F6
Gloster Meteor F8
de Havilland DH 100 Vampire
English Electric Canberra PR3
BAC Jet Provost T.5A
McDonnell Douglas Phantom FGR2
Phantom cockpit

Wings Over Wairarapa # 5: L-39 Albatros and de Havilland DH115 Vampire

There were only a couple of fixed-wing jets at the show this year, the L39 Albatros and the de Havilland DH115 Vampire, however, as always, they put on a fantastic display.

The Vampire was a British creation and the L39 Czechoslovakian, yet they seem to be a perfect match for a formation/aerobatic display. The Vampire was New Zealand's first operational jet fighter [I understand that there was a single example of another model that was earlier] and as such as a firm connectuion to this country.

The L39 is becoming popular as an entry-level warbird jet with [I think] three examples in the country now.

Not many photos this time - I need a better camera... and perhaps a little more skill on my part :-) Oh well!

Wings Over Wairarapa # 1: Getting there and back

I have been really looking forward to the Wings Over Wairarapa airshow, which was held today. Even the weather had been cooperative with nice days and [fairly] light winds over the past week or so.

Getting up today, the 2000' wind was up to around a 40 knot nor-westerly and the hills between Wellington and Masterton were topped with clouds :-(, hence the need to take a departure around the south-east of the hills [perhaps you can see an issue here...]. On the plus side, I got to swap planes, when 4 people bailed on the trip, and I got to fly a PA28-181 instead of a PA38-112 and took 3 passengers instead of 1. Yippee! The extra performance would be very helpful in the conditions.

The trip to Masterton was eventful. Turbulence was not as bad as it could have been [but still enough to keep me on my toes], but flying to the south-east of some hills in a strong nor-westerly was always going to make for a fun flight. If all this sounds familiar, it's probably because they are similar conditions to the last time I flew to Masterton for an airshow :-) Darn!!

Anyway, we got there and back. The airshow, which I will detail in future posts, was OK. The absence [due to a wheels up landing] of the Spitfire Mk IX was unfortunate, but the lack of any military "heavy metal" [apart from the Kaman Seasprite helo] was very disappointing - especially since all of the advertising material indicated the presence of both a P3 Orion and a Boeing B757. Some of the World War One aircraft appeared to be grounded due winds, but such is life I guess.

What follows are a few sample images. There are many many more that will posted over the next few days, so enjoy!

The pictures are as follows.

Piper PA28-181, ZK-TDJ - the aircraft I flew to the show.
de Havilland DH.115 Vampire
F4U Corsair
Harvard
Yak 52
UH1 Iroquois
Pacific Aerospace CT4/E
Taylor Monoplane U/L, ZK-FNR

Ohakea Open Day # 10: Ex-Military Jets

Airshows in New Zealand would not be complete without a range of ex-military aircraft attending and putting on a display. For a such small country, New Zealand has a proud reputation in the restoration and ex-military aircraft that have served in various western and eastern block countries over many decades. From reproduction WW1 through to 1960's designed trainers and fighter jets, we have a wide selection; not only available to view, but, importantly, in flying condition.

The support from this group of enthusiasts was very evident at the Ohakea open day.

In this post, we have pictures of many of the civilian owned and operated, ex-military jets at the open day. Top to bottom are:

de Havilland Vampire

L39 Albatross

Cessna Dragonfly [x2]

Albatross/ Vampire/ Dragonfly formation

Ohakea Open Day # 5: Apron: Civilian Aircraft

Continuing with my walk on the apron, here are some of the civilian aircraft on the apron. As you'll see, most of these are ex-military types, several of which have been operated by the RNZAF in years gone by. It took a while but we managed to drag ourselves into the public area in about 30 minutes [and well before the displays started] :-)

Top to bottom they are: Thunder Mustang, Yak 52, Harvard, Harvard Flightline, Hughes 369, Dragonfly/ L39 Albatross/ Vampire, L39 Albatross, P40/ P40/ Corsair/ Trojan, BF108 Taifun

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.

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