RAF Shawbury Families Day Thu 22 Aug 23

An overcast and blustery day saw club members supporting the annual RAF Shawbury Families Day.  It’s a great event and one to which we always look forward.  Sadly, this year we were not able to provide our usual support of the BGA glider simulator or the K21 set up for the kids’ photoshoot, so it was Ian’s aerobatic display that had the honour.

Hangar 4 was, as usual, packed with fascinating things for families to attract their interest or on which to try their hand.  

Outside, there was a pretty tasty line up of exotic and classic motas…..

……together with a static line up of aircraft.

Because of poor weather and strong winds many aircraft did not appear in the flying programme and so Ian’s display in R22 was brought forward.   John Luke drove the tug and with the wind just on limit we formed up outside Hangar 1 to move past the crowd to the launch point on r’way 23.

On the basis that anything was better than last year’s futile attempt🤓, this year Amelia had kindly volunteered to provide the commentary.  Many thanks Amelia for giving up your time today to travel to Shawbury.  Immaculate commentary BTW 😁

With low cloud base release height was 2,500 ft and this, together with a strong wind blowing toward the crowd line, did test our intrepid display pilot.  Top job Ian and many thanks.  Finally, at the end of the display everything was taken back to Hangar 1.

A great day out and one to put in the calendar for next year.