Air Show

[Reed]

Went to my first airshow in a lot of years today and it was the first time I was there to take photos. Things were going fine, getting a bunch of shots and planning on light and witty comments to make here on what I did wrong (a lot) and what I did right.

Two aircraft passed in front of the crowd and I followed the one to the left. I heard a noise and looked to the right....



My first reaction was "this isn't real", but it was too real.

You always hear people talk about the crowd going silent, well it really happens.

A member of the Trojan Horsemen Flight Demonstration Team went down, luckily far from the crowd this time. They are the only 6 ship T-28 Warbird formation demonstration team performing in the world today. They fly as a salute to the armed forces of the United States of America.

In the meantime, his teammates were flying overhead, not able to land:



When I got home and looked at the pics, more were out of focus than were.

It was not a good day.

[3bayjunkie]

oh man! i hope he is ok!!!

[Reed]

No, he is gone.

[Bruce A]

We saw the other one yesterday on the news here. Terribly sad. But why are air show flights crowd directional? Then there's this one today - again really sad, but it happens all too frequently.

[dlambert]

Wow - that's a memorable photo. Really sorry to hear about the pilot & plane. It takes a little longer to get out of those planes than it does to punch out of a jet w/ an ejection seat, so if something goes wrong, there isn't a lot of time to react. I was just watching a bit on the news this morning about a crash at the Reno air races, too -- seems like it's been a tough year for aviators.

[SwissJon]

Shit.. That's awful..

There's an airshow going on over my house at the moment.. I hope nothing bad happens here..

[RLucas]

Wow! This seems to be a disturbing trend at airshows lately! I am really sorry to hear about this and the loss of another pilot. You have a very memorable photo indeed!

[Hill Country Hack]

What a terrible thing. As long as there are fast moving heavy objects flying in close proximity to the ground and the folks gathered to watch, there will be incidents like this. Too bad for both of the pilots who gave their lives doing what they love to do.

Since the Raimstein disaster with the Italitan flying team, the crowds have been pushed back farther from the action and the direction of passes have been changed to lessen the chance of an out of control aircraft impacting the crowd. A vast majority of the pilots in this situation show great bravery by making every attempt to get the out of control aircraft away from the crowd and population centers. Those actions usually result in the demise of the pilot. They are to be commended.

Memorable shot you got there.

[Biomech]

I think I heard about that on the news.
Unfortunately, my first thought would be "shit, I missed the shot" :/

[NicoleScraps]

Reed, we have been to that airshow multiple times. I am so glad that we didn't go this year. I think that would have disturbed my kids quite a lot to witness something like that.