Every Year Biggin Hill seems to be very lucky with the weather and this year seemed to be no exception, Biggin on the Bump seemed to be in the middle of dense rain clouds and yet the sun was out for most of the the displays.
The 2009 RAF Hawk Display Aircraft with a special colour scheme.
As with most years there was a nice mix of both fast jets, warbirds and props. Unfortunately the show was hit by technical glitches with quite a few aircraft ‘going tech’ on each day, however with some creative rearranging this was barely noticeable.
To Celebrate 25 Years of Virgin Atlantic The Red Arrows were led into Biggin Hill by a Virgin Atlantic 747.
On the Sunday one of the local display pilots had a rather embarrassing incident when landing. Flt Lt Matt Barker burst a tyre on landing, unfortunately leaving the Hawk stranded at the end of the runway for about half an hour, fortunately Team Guinot who were due up next were able to use only half the runway to take off for displaying.
The Army Air Corps brought their toys in the form of an Apache and a Lynx as part of the Blue Eagles.
Other than a few minor problems with aircraft ‘going tech’ the rest of the show went off without a hitch, with displays from The Red Arrows, The Great War Display Team and Team Viper who are new to the display circuit. But without a doubt the display which left the crowd watching the sky in stunned silence was the Swift Glider Display Team who received the loudest round of applause at the end of their display.
The Red Bull Matadors put on their flawless routine of close formation aerobatics.
The Fly Navy 100 celebrations were unfortunately dampened a little by the Royal Navy Historic Flight aircraft being unserviceable and the de Haviland Sea Vixen unable to fly one of the days, however the Hawker Nimrod was still able to fly its full display on both days. There was some Naval Heavy Metal on display on both days in the form of a Douglas Skyraider, in U.S. Naval markings.
Hawker Hunter F58a Miss Demeanour makes a topside pass along the crowd flown by Jonathon Whaley.
Classic Jets were out in force this year, with Hawker Hunter F58a Miss Demeanour, F-86 Sabre, A Folland Gnat Pair, and of course The Vulcan. The Vulcan being one of the crowd favourites that everyone was looking forward to seeing, having unfortunately missed last year’s show it had been 17 years since XH558 had displayed at Biggin Hill.
The Vulcan finally returns to Biggin Hill after 17 years.
Warbirds were well represented as well, with Peter Teichman and his P-40 Kittyhawk in its new paint scheme straight from a new George Lucas film where the aircraft was starring as one of the Tuskagee Airmen aircraft. Also displaying were Spitfire MH434 and P-51 Mustang Ferocious Frankie who closed the show with their traditional close formation display, unfortunately on the Sunday Ferocious Frankie was unable to display and so a solo Spitfire display closed the Airshow with a couple of trips into the forbidden valley complete with audible gasps from the gathered crowd.
One of Team Guinot’s Boeing Stearman sits in the static park on Sunday Evening.
Hopefully next year’s show will be just as lucky with the weather and hopefully a bit luckier when it comes to participants serviceability.
