Peak year for UK classic airshows was?

I was never one for doing lots of airshows,I was lucky anyway because I worked in aviation from 1970 – 2015 and very rarely had to pay to get into airshows LOL,the sheer variety of aircraft on offer in the 60’s/70’s/80’s/90’s was usually impressive.

I grew up in scotland and in the 50’s + 60’s we regularly saw the likes of Scimitars,Lightnings and Starfighters in the course of normal squadron flying.I used to love going to Airshows at Leuchars (dad paid LOL).

Difficult to say my fave display a/c but a well flown Lightning Display was impressive as  was the Vulcan,I remember my first airshow down south (Alconbury 1966 ish) – there were some unimpressive/uninspiring displays flown by the USAF and then we had an RAF Hunter being flown very smoothly and enthusiastically and doing very low tight turns etc well within the airfield boundary 🙂 – we then got an overshoot followed by a very impressive full power steep  climbout by a Victor B(SR)2 straight up to High Altitude in a clear blue sky – I guess they did not have much fuel on board LOL but a very impressive sight and sound.

One of my other lovely aviation memories was the first time I saw/heard a Sea Fury,I was in the cockpit of a Canberra at Cottesmore in 1972ish doing some After Flight checks when I heard an approaching  smooth whiney howly noise,I leapt out of the cockpit to see the Fury doing a low level flat out pass along the main runway – what a lovely sound 🙂 

I cant see Boris or anyone else at the moment getting this pandemic virus under control until everyone accepts its endemic and we have to learn to live with it.

This virus is not going away any time soon so the quicker we all realise we catch it only from getting too close to someone infected with it the better most think its gone away but that is another story.

I think quite right we will want our air displays back, Duxford and Shuttleworth have seemed got the hang of it all and a big hat raise to them for that.

I am sure next season will be better than this season as we all adjust and good for the owner operators that they can get some money heading back to the bank.

Lots of new Spits to see soon, cant have enough Spits or any warbird in my book

Let’s be a little more optimistic in this thread. I do think that when Boris’s Bunch have really got Covid under long term control there are grounds to look forward to air displays starting again, Bournemouth happened this year and Eastbourne  needs some funding currently but it shows the intention IS there. 

Will we see a Mossie? I suspect we might. Just Jane will make a big ‘must see’ when she gets daylight under the tyres again. There’s things brewing at Duxford in Aircraft Restorations hangars including that Firefly and a certain ex Jim Pearce ‘Owl’. What else I wonder from there? Where ever we look things are going forward. Vintage helicopters are a very welcome addition.

Will Shoreham come back. Maybe when all the legal stuff stuff is sorted out and the local soreness and pain has receded a little. It did do so much for its Charity recipients along the years. There’s much more than the mere handfull of examples in this post.

There is much going on so lets cheer up and look forward and be more positive.

I very much concur and had no idea a Varsity was on the circuit at one stage. The jet issue is almost inevitable, in fact for me it’s the lack of multis that is the great shame at the moment, it is also suprising that there are no UK DC3 operator doing pleasure flights as dakotanorway.no have been successfully working around the escape slide issue for a decade… i sense a lack of enthusiasm. Within the next half decade IMO the only big ticket rare UK projects vintage piston projects I know of that may get airborne is the CR42 and just maybe a Mossie. The Dutch based Fokker XXI is also a hugely significant project IMO and and a likely visitor.

An interesting discussion, but  inevitably melancholy in tone as it laments times past,  and what we have lost.

Maybe the peak was between 1995-2005, when the warbird scene was really flourishing and growing, with a raised profile spinning off big screen productions like Memphis Belle ( a few years earlier ) , Piece of Cake,  Empire of the Sun, and others.  

The UK warbird restoration scene was really going up a gear, with significant numbers of Hurricanes and Spitfires joining the airshow circuit,  such that one of the Duxford balbos had nearly thirty aircraft. Now probably fewer than 20.  

The other factor has been the growing difficulties of elderly aircraft, often ex service, nursed along by enthusiastic groups who could keep them going up to  certain level of upkeep.   We saw groups operating and displaying types such as the Varsity,   maybe 10 years after the RAF released them.   Once an elderly aircraft becomes a really old aircraft, the level and magnitude of upkeep probably grounds it for good,  with the need for engine rebuild, maybe new spars,  or re-skinning. The fatal Provost crash highlighted the risk of old engines,  not getting the attention to keep them properly servicable.

Something like a Varsity, Pembroke, Twin Pioneer, Heron could easily mop up thousands of ££ in engineering, and yet will still be worth not much on the market, as it is a type not much in demand.  The same money spent on a WW2 fighter WILL  give you a return, and is a valuable asset.  With DC-6s and Dakotas grounded and dispersed, there can never be another Classic Airliner show like the one at Coventry.

The vintage jet scene has suffered for the same reason.  For instance, the ex Swiss Venoms could fly for a few years after demob,  but when significant money was needed to keep them going, there was no real interest.  Even our last flying Vampire is struggling to find a new home.  Blameless Hunters have had a curse put upon them, and they seem to have a meagre future in the UK, and the Jet scene is now a handful of Provosts and Gnats.

The future seems to be the glamourous, high profile. heroic types, Spitfires and more Spitfires,  and the other major fighters,  especially the Mustang.   Hopefully the Lancaster, B-17, Catalina and some Dakotas can keep going, but multi-engined types are uncommon now. I think we will see a Mosquito in the next few years.

I guess we just have to enjoy whatever the airshow season brings us. As the old song goes-

”You don’t know what you’ve got ’till it’s gone…”

Whilst somewhat subjective it was more around the historic aircraft rather than those then in service at the time of the show and more wrt the sheer volume of different types,.whilst 1980/90s was no doubt buzzing with famous ww2 pilots on ground  and derring-do do display’s, I wonder if the peak in terms of variety, display quality and volume was later and post 2000 when a lot of rare projects appear and the sheer number of  by then restored aircraft and maybe a more established international movement of warbirds , plus German based aircraft were entering the mix as well.

As a light aircraft fan I would say 2005-2015 had some great arrivals. Miss the atmosphere of the Moth club Woburn events.  

As a small boy I was taken to Biggin Hill (probably a BoB display) sometime in the early 60s. I remember Yellowjack Gnats, Blue Diamond, Hunters, another team of black Hunters, Pelicans and etc. but the most memorable was the four ship Lightning display, I believe No.1 Squadron. They came in behind the crowd appearing silently (transonic?) before applying reheat and rotating into a vertical climb. The ground shook and a small boy went “Wow!” You don’t (won’t) see anything like that nowadays!

I think it is all relative to personal experience. I have a friend in his late 80’s who says no airshow could ever match the closing stages of WW2. Then again he relates tails of the early Battle of Britain displays and some truely dangerous flying. For me it would be the late 70’s to the mid 90’s. Biggin Hill was THE greatest civil show during the late 70’s period. Warbirds were still very rare and Biggin brought them together. It was far easier to get  Vulcan, or Lightning for a display than a Spitfire. By the 90’s though Biggin had lost lots of interest for me.

Of course the fall of the Berlin Wall made a massive diffrence with types we could only dream of. Thirty years later we are back in that state. To see Migs, Sukhois etc, plus the final years of F-104’s etc, along with newly retired mil jets and new warbirds was very exciting. Plus there were plenty of non airshow spotting, just without the modern day tech. For the pinnacle of those years I would say 89-95ish.

The Fighter Meets at North Weald during the 1980s up to the mid 90s for me for sure.