Tag Archives: military

Have I Ever Seen a Boomerang?

Before you think I am being ridiculous, I am not referring to the profiled wood that will come back to you but the plane. In fact, there is more than one plane called the Boomerang. A Rutan design called the Boomerang was a one off which I once saw on the ground at Oshkosh. However, it was also the name of a piston fighter built in Australia. I had never seen one of those before. If I am being totally honest, I still haven’t since the one I saw was a replica built but it is a pretty impressive replica so we shall let that go.

It was brought to the Festival of Flight that was held by the Shuttleworth Trust at Old Warden in the summer. Having an old type with an unfamiliar shape when you can get blasé about the various Spitfires, Hurricanes, Mustangs etc. is a nice change. It had a great paint job, and the tighter confines of Old Warden allowed it to be displayed nice and close to the crowd line. Certainly, one of the more notable things I got to shoot this year.

Portugal’s Merlins Just Look Better

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The AW101 is a great looking helicopter. I saw the original prototypes fly in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s including one that was configured as a civilian passenger type (sadly never to have the demand to make it to production). Since that time, I have liked to get photos of them wherever possible. The Canadian Cormorants look great in their yellow paint, and I finally got shots of them last year. Normally they are not painted in a very exciting way.

However, the Portuguese Merlin came to display at RIAT this year and it was way better looking than the average. It has a camouflage finish which seems to be a rarity these days. The colours of the camo were also quite vibrant, and it made for a striking subject. It certainly helped that the crew were throwing it around quite energetically and performed on more than one occasion, so I got plenty of shots of it.

An air show is an opportunity to see an airframe performing in ways that you wouldn’t normally get but it is also a rather sterile environment. These helicopters are used for search and rescue along the coastline of Portugal, and I imagine it would be really nice to get to photograph them in their “natural habitat” with cliffs and the see behind them. Maybe I might find myself out there one day.

Taking a Chance With the T-38 Landing

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The T-38 chase planes that Boeing operates from Boeing Field did not fly as often as I would have liked. I’m sure they got plenty of use out of them, but it seemed to be a lucky break if one was up – particularly if I was in any place to see them. Consequently, I was always wondering whether I should make sure to get a sharp shot or take a chance on getting a more interesting look to the image. On this occasion, I decided to go with the latter. I dropped the shutter speed down to 1/100th of a second and hoped. A few came out okay. The cluttered background at Boeing Field is always a problem so a bit of blur helps put the focus on the plane.

Super Bugs at Bremerton

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One of the last air shows I attended before we left the Pacific Northwest was at Bremerton. The unusual thing about this air show was that I didn’t head there alone. Instead, Nancy came along with me. It is a long time since she last came to a show with me, but the good news was that she enjoyed it! One of the parts of the show that she found the best was the US Navy’s Super Hornet display. They ripped up the sky for a while. Their blast across the field from crowd rear particularly amused her!

The conditions not ideal from a lighting point of view but there was humidity in the air with the upside that the jet was created plenty of spluff. One of the passes in particular created a lot of cloud activity. It made for a difficult image to process given the contrast with the cloudy background and that its own clouds needed not to be over exposed. I suspect I shall probably try reprocessing this again in the future as either my techniques improve, or the software gets more advanced. I did have a bit too much lens for the closest part of the pass – oh well…

The History of Harriers in One Place

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The Brooklands Museum might be located in the home of Vickers and include a lot of Vickers exhibits, but it also has some Hawker products too. I might be slightly exaggerating about the full history of Harriers, but they have three different examples of the Harrier lineage on display. The first is actually a Harrier but a P1127. The original demonstrator that led to the Kestrel and ultimately the Harrier. The design philosophy is clearly the same, but this was the beginning of the journey for the Kingston design team.

Then there is a Harrier GR1. Unusually it is fitted with the extended wingtips which provided a little extra fuel and a slight reduction in drag. The reason the plane is fitted with them is that it is one of the airframes that took place in the Transatlantic Air Race and won. It is surrounded by some displays of the race and the competitors it defeated – most importantly the Royal Navy!

Last but by no means least is a two-seater, G-VTOL/ZA250. This was a company funded demonstrator and was a regular sight at air shows throughout the 80s. It undertook sales campaigns with various countries and undertook trials of things like the ski jump take off and the Skyhook concept. It seemed to be in a different paint scheme every time I ever saw it on TV. Sure, no Sea Harrier or Harrier II but this is quite a collection to have in one place.

A Hawk With Many Guises

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In the days when the old Hawker plant at Kingston/Dunsfold was still around, products like the Harrier and Hawk were generating plenty of revenue and opportunities. The company would build its own demonstrators for use outside the scope of the core client – the RAF. A Hawk airframe was company funded and it was registered G-HAWK. It was originally built as a 60 Series jet before having modifications to reflect the airframe shape of the 100 Series. It also had a COMA serial of ZA101 added at some point.

This aircraft moved to Warton when Dunsfold closed and continued to be used for all sorts of development work. I was long gone from Warton by the time its use ended. I was, therefore, pretty pleased to see it again at the Brooklands Museum. It is in the BAe house colours, but the nose is not a shape I recognise. I guess it did something interesting that needed another nose to be grafted on. I photographed this jet at various times over the years (although very little when I worked at Warton and could have seen it frequently!).

Is This Wildcat Carrying Enough?

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RIAT was visited by a number of AW159 Wildcats for the show. The Navy and Army brought examples with the Navy showing theirs as part of the Black Cats team. Midway through the show, another Navy example showed up. Unlike the others, this one was carrying external stores. The original Lynx looked heavily loaded if it was carrying four Sea Skuas, but this one really did look like it was ready for anything. I’m not sure if this is the Martlet missile installation or something else but, whatever it is, there was no shortage of capability on display.

Before the Atlantique, There Was the Atlantic!

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I posted recently with some shots of the Dassault Atlantique that was at RIAT. However, that got me thinking of the history of the Atlantique. It was actually an update to a previous generation plane. This was the Atlantic. Operated by France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Pakistan, the Atlantic design was updated to create the Atlantique and the Atlantics were retired. I knew I had seen some of them for real and that was likely to be at Mildenhall when the Air Fete was able to attract a wide variety of operators and types. Turns out it was the French and German versions I got to see. Here are some shots of them.

An E-3F For the First Time for Me

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The early 90s had both the RAF and the French Air Force buying new airborne early warning aircraft in the form of the E-3. Unlike the USAF and NATO jets, these included the upgrade to the CFM56 engines which improved endurance and performance. I saw the RAF’s jets on many occasions but never encountered a French jet until this year – after the RAF jets have been retired and not long before the French ones follow suit. I’m not sure how much longer they have but seeing one arriving and departing the show was a nice result. I was pretty happy that I happened to be at the arrival end when it came in which was a bonus.

Rows of A400Ms

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My visit to Brize Norton to have a trip with 101 Sqn wrapped up when we landed back at Brize. As we exited the aircraft and waited on the ramp to get some group photos, we were surrounded by other aircraft. More Voyagers were lined up but there were plenty of A400M Atlas transports ready for their next mission. It was a pleasant afternoon with nice light on the planes so I grabbed a few shots of the planes before we gathered for our group photo.