Super Southend

Dean West reports from Southend Airports open day in connection with the Southend airshow.  All photos copyright of author.

Down saarf

2005 was almost the final year for the Southend Airshow, which personally would have been a great shame with the show only being about a 45 minute drive down the road from me. For years it's been held over the weekend of the last Bank Holiday in May, being able to boast the fact that the show has attracted performers such as the Frecce Tricolori, SAAB Draken and F-117 Nighthawk, laregely due to the fact that Mildenhall Air Fete was held on the same weekend. Nowadays, with Air Fete no longer on, and looking ever less likely that it will return, Southend Airshow no longer manages to pull these gems but the guys and girls behind the scenes still manage to pull off a great show.

The RAF was out in force with displays from a Hawk T1, Tucano T1, C-130J Tac Demo aswell as the RAF Falcons, Chinook HC2, SeaKing HAR3A, Harrier Gr7, Tornado Gr4 and the Typhoon F2 as well as the BBMF trio of Lancaster, Hurricane and Spitfire. All of these aircraft, bar the SeaKing, were present at the airport for the open day, with their spares, along with other many civil items.As typical of a Bank Holiday, the weather didn't totally play ball with some very heavy showers through the day and dark clouds always in sight, although the sun did pop out from time to time.

The weather effected only the first part of the Monday flying display, with the RAF Falcons being put back later. The display opened with acts from various civil aircraft, the first being the Essex Air Ambulance EC135, followed by the Team Road Angel Pitts Special. Next up would have been Hunter FGA.9 XE601 (G-ETPS) but unfortunately it did not make it away from it's home base at Exeter, which suffered a leak from the jet pipe. The organisers managed to get the F-86 from Duxford to fill in for this, which made some very nice passes at the airport before departing to display along the seafront. First of the military aircraft to display was the Tucano T1, the special scheme display aircraft not being used.

Soon after this was the RAF Tornado Gr4 from 15 Sqn, RAF Lossiemouth, one of my highlights. The airport has the great advantage that you can stand so close to an aircraft as mighty as the Tornado while it starts up and taxies up, before you make the mad dash to the runway to see it depart in the wet conditions.

 The Air Cadets that were present were each treated to a flight in the Royal Navy Lynx pair, Commando or the RAF Chinook, which were up and down all throughout the day, whatever the weather. The great skill of the Lynx pilots was demonstrated when they came in very low and very slowly along one of the taxiways while making full 360 rotations causing the cut grass and umbrellas to go all over the place!
The Royal Navy Commando previously mentioned was an unusual item to at a show, displaying a role demo over the seafront, probably in something similar to what the RNLAF Bell AB412 would had done if it'd made it to the show.

Apart from the F-86, the only other civil jet present at the show was the Sea Vixen, in it's bold Red Bull scheme, which forunately operated from the airport, where it's display over the seafront could still be very clearly heard from!

The only non-fliers during the day were the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, the fighters being weathered in elsewhere and the Lancaster unfortunately having some problems.
There was no lack of civil props and pistons present at the airport, 4 of Utterly Butterly's being parked up near the terminal, The Aerostars flying Yak-50's and 52's from North Weald who kindly performed afew loops over the airport before heading home. A newly formed team, The Blades, led by Ex-Red Arrows leader Andy Offer were also present flying 4 Extra 300's, recently being in the news for having displayed at none other than Beckingham Palace. A very unusual trio of Rutan VariEz came from France as the Patrouille Reva but they didn't seem to grab the attention of the airport visitors that much.

The last hour of the day was almost totally devoted to RAF displays, the first being the C-130J Hercules performing the Tac Demo with it's trademark Khe Sahn descent visible from the airport, diving down towards the Thames Estuary before disappearing between the intervening skyline. The Hawk T1 also displayed in wonderful weather, the sun beating down on the 2006 display scheme celebrating 85 years of 4FTS. The penultimate display of the 2006 was by the Harrier Gr7, always a crowd favourite, which returned from its display amid some very dark rain clouds.

The show was closed by what must be the highlight, for the first time this year the RAF displayed the Typhoon F2 to the public. Departing in the sun with almost everyone present at the airport gathering along the runway to watch it power off to its display. However its return was a little wetter, as about 1 minute before it made its fast pass over the runway the heavens opened, such a shame but certainly one closing to a show that I won't be forgetting.
The good news is that Southend Airshow has managed to attract more sponsors to keep it running until at least 2008, here's to 2007 and lets hope the weathers a little better!