cat7There was a strong smell of fuel after the Skyraider had safely shut down, I saw the fire truck maybe they just washed down a small fuel spill.
The Spifire take off (sorry dont know which one) was interesting from my view point pilot seem the lift the tail too quick then throttled back and vered of line, probably had to over correct for the windly conditions.
I was listening on a borrowed scanner and heard the Skyraider pilot report engine problems , the tower cleared the display area for a quick landing, which I suspect is why the Buckers display didnt take place. Fortunately it all ended well without further incident
It was my first Legends for a 3-4 years, but I was suprised to arrive very late at the car parks at 1:40pm (long story, dont ask :mad:) and get straight on without queueing or even using the overflow carpark, unlike the spring show when all the carparks seemed to fill very quickly. Was it quieter than usual or is this normal these days ?
A great show though despite the arctic wind that blew in from time to time. Highlights for me had to be the P-47 and P-38 although I even enjoyed the Aerostars despite my initial prejudice about them not being WW2-era warbirds – I thought they put on a cracking display.
cat7Thanks for the information Richard, it’s very interesting :).
I’ve been to West Green farm many times with my children because it now has a childrens indoor play area, yet I never knew about the crash there
cat79th May 1942 Do 217E-4 from 1/KG2 Hit balloon cable over Lakenham. Norwich. Shot down by LAA at Stoke holy cross Norwich crashed at West Poringland 5 miles.
Do you have any more details about that particular incident ? I live in the area but hadn’t heard of it until I read your post and would like to know more about it
cat7He’s got one at Attlebridge as well, if this bird flu keeps up ,he might need to diversify, perhaps when all the birds have gone, he’ll take the over spill from Coltishall….
It can be seen quite clearly on google maps here, I didnt realise so much of it was left although the concrete visible from the road looks a bit weatherbeaten
cat7Sorry, I don’t buy this lack of view thing at all. The aeroplanes are in the sky – look up. Incidentally most adults with cameras do mind small children squeezing in front – they are invariably poorly behaved and only interested in kicking the fence.
Fair enough, we’re all entitled to our opinions. But, for us, the ground view is a big part of it and if we dont think we’ll be able to see we’ll go somewhere else, simple as that.
As I said before, seeing the takeoff, landing and taxying is a big part of the show for us, and I think my son gets more of a thrill from seeing a running aircraft on the taxiway 25 yards in front of him than the same plane high up in the air and further away from the crowdline. He also likes waving to the crews and them waving back, which may not be a big deal to you but it is to him; and I know who I’m going to take more notice of 🙂
My experience with kids standing in front of adults is obviously different to yours – firstly we always ask, secondly I make sure they dont stand in front of people with cameras, and finally they are told in no uncertain terms to behave, which they do. This is irrespective of what event we’re at.
cat7…. bearing in mind they are performing their displays several hundred feet above the ground, I would suggest to you that airshows are clearly not a viable spectator sport for gnomes.
Dont forget that todays gnome may be a 9 year old with the potential to turn into tomorrows paying adult 🙂 Seeing the aircraft take off, land and then taxi in front of us is part of the show, especially if you’re 9, and if that view is blocked by tents and windbreaks it does reduce the enjoyment somewhat.
Its true that if people stand up then the view is also diminished but the sheer volume of tents and windbreaks forces the ‘standees’ (for want of a better word) into a much smaller space. Plus, most adults dont mind a small child squeezing in front of them (even if his dad has to stand at the back 🙂 ) whereas this cant be done so easily when there are VIP tents and windbreaks in the way.
cat7I consider myself to be more of a member of the public with a moderate interest in aircraft than a true dyed-in-the-wool enthusiast. I buy the occasional magazine and book, and can tell the difference between a Spitfire and a Hurricane but struggle when asked which Mark of Spitfire I’m looking at 😮
So, I hope my comments might be closer to the ‘man in the street’ than some other people here (no offence intended BTW) although I cant claim to be representative of the genuine MoP with no interest in aviation at all. I’ve been to Legends for about 4 or 5 of the last 7 or 8 years, and have taken my plane-mad 9-year old to the last 2 or 3
Things I like :-
😀 The overall atmosphere of the day. I’ve never experienced any rudeness or bad behaviour etc although I may have been lucky and/or not in the wrong place
😀 Seeing wonderful old aircraft being flown in such numbers and with such enthusiasm
😀 The sounds and smells
😀 Seeing the planes up close on the flightline
😀 Seeing them taxi past just in front of the crowdline, assuming we can get a decent view (more on this later…)
😀 The ‘market stalls’ – we spend a fair bit of time browsing through and buying odd bits and peices
😀 The museum itself – we sometimes visit on non-airshow days just because we like it anyway but always try to have a quick look around even on Legends days
Things I’m not so keen on :-
😡 The cost of entry, I know airshows are expensive things to run but it means I only take the plane-mad 9-year old and not his less-interested little brother or his mum, so it stops being a family day out and turns into a treat for which I have to repay the little brother later on (not that I mind but its nice for all of us all go out together)
😡 Paying again for the flightline walk and a programme – I’d rather pay for these up front even if it means the cost goes up even more
😡 Being ripped off over the price of food, drinks and icecreams. We usually take our own food but £1.40 for a Calippo is taking the **** when the ice-cream vans at the coast charge 80p-£1 for the same thing
😡 not being able to get a decent view despite the high cost of admission, especially my son as he’s quite short. The VIP tents etc take up far too much of the flightline, the windbreaks are too tall for my son to see over and there are no grandstands to make up for it.
😡 finding tents, windbreaks and chairs padlocked to the railings , some of which appear to have been there all night. Plain selfish IMHO and if I ran the show I’d be going round with a set of boltcutters the night before to cut them off and would burn the lot of them.
Will we go this year ? I dont know at the moment. It depends on whether the 9-year-old wants to go, what the weather’s like, whether anything else comes up and so on. We live about 90 minutes drive away so we’ll probably go to at least one Duxford show but it may not be Legends.
cat7And for anyone who’s ever wondered what DOES happen if you do a mag check either without someone sitting on the tailplane, or the stick pulled right back……….this is expensive!!
ouch 😮
cat7Tail wheel aircraft are susceptible to tailwinds when taxying. In other words the breeze could get under the tail feathers raise the tail and risk a prop strike (VERRRRRRY expensive!!).
Getting a handsome ground engineer, or two, sitting there as ballast makes the exercise a lot safer. Once you are pointing into wind there is no problem.
Hope that helps?
MM
It does, thankyou (and also to Bob for his earlier reply) 🙂 It’s so obvious now that you’ve told me that I should have worked it out myself 😮
cat7Just a few random(ish) thoughts from some one who considers himself to be somewhere between an average member of the public (whatever that is..) and a dyed-in-the-wool enthusiast; I like aeroplanes and enjoy watching them fly, I buy the occasional aviation magazine and very very occasional book, but thats about as far as it goes. An expert I most certainly am not 🙂
I think we are astonishingly lucky to have a show like Legends every single year; I assume from the lack of forum and press coverage that there just isnt really anything like it elsewhere in Europe. If Legends stopped we’d all have a lot more to moan about than we do now ……
The cost of entry is a thorny problem; if it was less would more people go, and would the organisers cover their costs ? I took my oldest child and it cost £40 to get in plus a fiver for the programme. I would have paid another £8 for the flightline walk but he didnt want to do it and actually said he thought it was too expensive. If I’d taken child #2 and my wife we could easily have spent the thick end of £100, which is a lot for a day out.
It would be a shame if it got so expensive that not enough people went to support the show; as it was I felt that Sunday wasnt as busy this year as it was in 2005.
Windbreaks annoy me; I understand the mentality but I think its very selfish. As is happens were were lucky enough to get a space against the barrier between two camps but as my son is a very small 9-year-old he’d have struggled to see otherwise.
The vast amount of space devoted to the corporate tents also annoys me; it means that the majority of the crowd are compressed into a much smaller space than would be necessary otherwise. I can see the need for a ‘vip’ area but its got a bit too big IMHO.
I think the grandstand idea is a good one, I’d even consider paying for a seat if we could keep it all day so long as it wasnt excessively priced.
Overall I really enjoyed it and despite the cost I’ll go again next year; I’ve been for 5 out of the last 7 and its just something I want to keep doing.
Finally, after all my ramblings 😮 , a question: What was the purpose of the mechanics sitting on the tails of the Spitfires ? I guess it helps with taxying but I dont understand why and it’s getting embarrassing when my son keeps asking me and I dont know the answer 🙂
cat7There are a lot of useful links on google globetrotting , e.g aircraft in flight , military aircraft including a shot of the B36 at Lackland AFB and various museums.
Fascinating stuff 😀 . We’ve been banned from using it at work, its hardly suprising really :rolleyes:
cat7Given the political climate of the time, (snip)
Unless you were aboard the Apollo craft heading for the moon, we’ll never truly know if it really happened or not! 😉
Here we go again….. 😡
:confused: Given the political climate of the time, why did the Russians congratulate the Americans on their achievement instead of loudly proclaiming it a fake because their tracking stations couldnt get a signal ?
:confused: It takes more than a few astronauts to pull off a fake of this magnitude, and after 36 years dont you think someone would have broken ranks by now ?
:confused: What about the laser reflectors left on the moon, which can still be ‘activated’ by shining a laser at them ?
:confused: Why repeat the same fake over and over again ? Once would have been enough
:confused: Where did the Apollo 11 go once it took off (you cant seriously believe the lift-offs didnt happen, can you ?). If it stayed in earth orbit until splashdown it wouldnt have been hard to spot – tiny satellites can easily be seen on most nights and the shuttle is a big bright dot , so something the size of an Apollo command module should easily be seen. And the telemetry would have been traceable to earth orbit.
Frankly, all this talk of fakes is a gross insult to the astronauts in question, all of whom risked their lives, some of them nearly lost them (Apollo 13) and some did lose them (Apollo 1).
Rant over, I’ll calm down and do some work now 🙂
cat7Also, have a look at Google moon which shows the landing sites – as an additional feature, if you zoom right in you can see what the moon is made of 🙂
cat7Its a fascinating place – I did a trackday there back in April and although we werent allowed to look around it was possible to see some of the hangars and other buildings on the way in. To give you an idea, there is one photo here of a hangar and the old control tower
cat7Superb !!!
You should try to persuade your CO to get these made up into posters, with the proceeds going to the Royal British Legion and/or one of the other charities that support ex-servicemen
Sign In
