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Just Had A Fantastic Day Out...

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racing girl

racing girl

Jedi Knight
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... at the Thunder Over Michigan airshow just down the road from me. The emphasis this year was on the WWII era with Hurricanes, Spitfires, Mustangs, a Mescherschmidtt and one of the only two flying Lancasters left in the world. The Lancaster will fly tomorrow, but we got to tour it, which was an amazing experience. They also did legacy flights, with "then and now" aircraft and they had a large display of trainer planes, mainly Harvards. The Canadian Skyhawk Parachute Team opened up proceedings and we finished with the Avenger and Skyraiders. There was also America's largest re-enactment of a WWII battle, with over 250 people taking part and a lot of very interesting military vehicles and tanks. When they called in the air support, in came three beautiful P51 Mustangs to finish off the German heavy artillary! A great day. Just about to hook the camera up to the TV to view the pics, will try and post some later.

RG /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/england.gif
 
Cool!
 
Yet another reminder to kick myself sometimes, for why I moved back to Alberta... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Anyway, speaking of Lancaster bombers, there is one on display just south of Calgary in the small town of Nanton, my understanding is that they aren't planning to restore it (too far gone?)

And, amazingly enough, I don't have a photo of it yet... It's on my very long list of "things to get around to photographing"
 
DRAT!! Twenty miles down the road, and I missed it! I've got a prior commitment today, so I guess I'll have to wait until next year. I think the Lanc is flying out of Hamilton, Ontario.
RG, did you see the 51 fly over the track last weekend? He was at 5000 feet or so, but you still can't mistake the sound of a Merlin!
Jeff
 
[ QUOTE ]
Anyway, speaking of Lancaster bombers, there is one on display just south of Calgary in the small town of Nanton, my understanding is that they aren't planning to restore it (too far gone?)

[/ QUOTE ]

Which just means no one with the money to do it wants it. The chap in town that restores British WWII fighters just finished a Hurricane. Less than 4% is original, so its practically a brand new Hurricane. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Reminded me of the Frank & Troise cartoon in road and track where a guys brings a mechanic a broken wheel and asks him to restore the car. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cheers.gif
 
Just found their website (the one in Alberta here)

https://www.lancastermuseum.ca/

I must make a correction, perhaps they are attempting a restoration... https://www.lancastermuseum.ca/restore.html

I suspect I was remembering back to the time (how long ago? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif) when we drove through Nanton on family trips and the Lancaster was just on display outside, now it looks like they have a full museum facility! There is a timeline somewhere on their website which confirms how long ago that memory was... Must make a point of making a visit down there, probably in the fall sometime
 
I'm always amazed at how small/crude the aircraft of that era were. The people flying them were intrepid folk.

We did see a C-141 Starlifter (the very one which returned our POW's in) at the local USAF base last year and THAT seems small (inside) to me now. When I was flying IN one I thought it roomy! And Herself got to see the insides of a C-5A... they wouldn't allow us to go "upstairs" tho. And all the "gunboats" were "busy" at the time, so no Spectre. THAT is still an impressive weapons system.
 
Jeff - Yes, the Lancaster is out of Hamilton, Ontario. Looks like they've got a really nice musuem up there too. I hope they got it airborne on the Sunday, it costs $3,000 an hour just to keep in the air. I didn't see the Mustang at the race track, bummer! A snippet from the program about the Mustangs that I never knew..... Britain was having serious problems keeping up with the demand of supplying aircraft for the war, supplies were hard to come by and the industrial belts of the UK had been hard hit by the German attacks.... so they challanged America to help out and design a fighter plane.... in only 120 days! The Mustang went from drawing board to first flight with 3 days to spare!

On Sunday morning we took our kayaks to a local lake and were paddling around enjoying the peace and quiet, when from behind, we heard the unmistakable sound of a couple of large piston engines... turning around and looking up, we spotted two aircraft at about 2,000ft, heading due West. I called out to Andrew that if they were going to the second day of the airshow they needed to hang a left and head South.... no sooner were the words out of my mouth, they reached the end of the lake, banked steeply to the left and turned South.... so I guess they were headed there after all. They had a very short, stubby front end, and as they turned the sun sparkled off their immaculate aluminum bodywork. Based on what we had seen at the show on Saturday, we reckoned they were Thunderbolts.

I forgot to tell you about the Thunderbolt display..... seven of them, all beautifully restored, flying in formation and trailing colored smoke. A tremendous sight.

On Saturday night Andrew asked me which was my favourite plane at the show. Without hesitation, I replied " the Mustangs".

But after thinking for a few minutes about everything we'd seen that day, I realised that while the jet engined planes were phemomenal in their power and handling (we had flying displays from a Hawk, a Goshawk and an F16), there is nothing in this world that matches the sight, and especially the sound, of a piston engined aircraft.

RG /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/england.gif
 
One of the reasons I like the movie Iron Eagle II... That and the Rutan fighter concept. Other than the planes... the movie sucks and is completely unbelievable.
 
F-4's, BABEE!!!! Two ROCKETS and ~some~ control surface!!


...I really like the P-51's too... and Bert Rutan is one of my Contemporary Heroes.
 
RG, I agree about piston engine aircraft, but especially the ones with big round motors.
I've got a friend in southern Indiana with a Thunderbolt. I wonder if he was up for the show.
Doc, F-4'S.....Double Ugly....Rhino...YUK!
Single engine, single seat. The ONLY way to fly!
Jeff
 
mehheh. If you say so. I had to be "cargo" so it was a better ride than an OV-10. Not as good as a Spectre mission (safety-wise) but a darned good RUSH if Maghia Pass was involved. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/devilgrin.gif


...BTW: found another of the rotor-wing whackos in my area last Thursday. "Eastern Thailand" F.O.O....
 
[ QUOTE ]
"Eastern Thailand"

[/ QUOTE ]
/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Spent a couple of tours there. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/devilgrin.gif Actually, "North Eastern Thailand."
Jeff
 
Spent a year in Korat in the Army Signal Corps. My hooch was right next to the air base. When I first got there I thought how the heck am I ever going to get some sleep with these jets barreling down the runway at four in the morning?? After about a week, you didn't hear them anymore. They finally put mufflers on them. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/jester.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/jester.gif
 
Udorn Taunie 63-64 . Air America.

A really fun place as I remember, hehe.
 
T-28s, Goons, Platius Porters, chopers of all kinds, etc etc, Birddogs. God what a mess we had. I remember when Udorn was paved. Had the neatest motercycle, a Honda 150 with the new 160 engine. Go it did. Was only one car in the entire provence, was trucks though.
 
Oh think ours were Js with the little jets added on. Yea Stallions are too cool with 20mm gatling guns.

Note, later 10 years or so, I had the last stallion in the world. Really, in cambodia. Had lots of parts for a change, hehe.
 
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