12th Annual Abingdon Air & Country Charity Show..08/05/2011

[REHEAT1230]

First of all - many many thanks to all for attending the show - Neil / Andy being the main organisers are very grateful for all your support & were grateful to DE for allowing near enough a full return of aircraft back on the floor, as to aircraft enthusiasts this is part of the show element... take it away and the show ceases!

We played some gambles and they paid off. Weather turned out good aswell and of course getting the Vulcan this year as our star item certainly made the day! Got to try and top that next year!!

Few things, we are sorry you had to queue to get out, luckily opening both North & South gates to get people moving helped..

The Puma was 're-instated' pretty late on Friday because of ongoing training exercises etc, and hence why one came in very early before the hoards arrived - but both the 'doorless' Merlin and Puma had to return to Benson that evening for operational reasons.

We thought it was a K Herk, but a K or J doesn't bother us - we were again very grateful for authorisation to be given for a single flyby.. you don't see many C130 flythru's.

All aircraft displays were good, but the wind was too strong for the BBMF Spitfire 'duo' to come across from their bolthole of Bournemouth airport, and Team Osprey had technical probs etc.

The ground side contained alot of diverse items - where else would you see a ships auxilary power unit 'run up'..

Anyhow we thank you all again - take care and see you next year.

The team

Top show mate as we live in Oxford we will always go,i liked the ground entertainment aswell like Rick chase he played at our wedding.

[The Baron]

Fantastic day out as always. Many thanks to you guys that organised it and long may it continue. Highlights? Besides the incredible 558, the Pembroke and Provost were great. I always love seeing these at shows. And the Jungmeister display. Thanks once again.

[RickIngham]

Don't worrie i'm sure someone will have caught the low departure of the bronco

I managed to get her top side on when we was just going out of the show ground picture is hear if your on facebook- http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid= ... =1&theater

That's a nice pic! Wouldn't it be great if someone was stood at the threshold and got it low head on...and trailing smoke! That would be nice!

[maffie]

Just incase you were in your cars on the way home. Heres a little clip of the 2 helicopters leaving.

Many thanks to the organisers. This was our first time to Abingdon and it's nice to see different types of aircraft displaying out there on the circuit

Matt

[Ponti]

Matt, great video. Those marshals get everywhere

[AMB]

Probably one of the best Abingdon Air & Country shows so far, despite Defence Estates being 'difficult' (not allowing large aircraft or jets to land!). Shame the special scheme RAF Tucano was replaced by a standard black one. Other than that, content couldn't be faulted and a great relief it didn't rain! Well done guys - great show!

[Vulcanhopefull]

Well done Neil and co and all the organisors for what was one again ,againts the odds a great show. Will the state of the runway becoming a major issue for fast jets though see the show be more difficult to organise? I really hope not as its become a must visit for me and my family and we wish you all the very best luck for the future. Can't someone convince DE or MOD to spend a few Mil on runway repairs ?? I am sure a few MP's can redirect their 2nd house claims to the fund !!!!

[Oldtower]

Re the runways, the main runway within the useable length (between 18 threshold & 36 displaced (permanent) threshold is surface wise fine, we say permanent displaced because when the army built the mil entrance off the end of runway 36, naturally the original threshold couldn't be used! So a good 5,500ft length is useable, the ends are out of bounds (and suffering light surface break up as a different texture & where Army heavy lorries have turned on it over the years have taken off some of this texture on the ends).
There are cracks along it ie along alot of the joins but thats just wear & tear over time.

08 / 26 runway (shorter one) is useable but again has cracking on it ie the joins.... in truth all it needs on both is hot bitumen in the cracks and the problems solved, but in DE's eyes in its current state its a FOD issue and don't want to take the risk of a jet ingesting a loose piece of asphalt from within the crack for example, even tho the runways over the last 12 years haven't changed their appearance that much & the team do a comprehensive FOD sweep of the runways over the show weekend.
We can see their concerns but we'd rather now see a compromise ie like we had this year which is miles better than the ridiculous total fixed wing ban of 2010, as without any aircraft on the floor, its not making the show viable to run. You cannot go from a 2009 show with up to C17, to nothing bar 3 heli's in 2010, to two thirds of a show back in 2011, to potentially nothing in 2012.
The heavies are technically fine to use Abingdon as have proved (& still do on odd occasions with C130), but is down to DE being cautious. The 'J bird C130 we had this year was originally a weekend stayer!!!
Its down to the based RAF unit / Station to do what they can for limited maintenance on them, DE will not pay anything for repairs as we are led to believe..

And as somebody pointed out, its not disused, merely non-operational but has military flying training that takes place on their ie; Heli's & Motorgliders etc & is marked on aeronautical maps being so.

One thing we did note was unfortunetly it has come to light that a low peri fence within the western side nearly out of sight was trodden down (it wasn't the best in the first place) for some to park elsewhere to walk down / thru the fence and bypass the paygate.. thereby allowing some free entry!
This is despite patrols around that general area, it is so depressing to find this out when we all work extremely hard to put on a decent show, try to raise some funds for the Air Ambulance for people to come & do this.

We will be reviewing again the layout to try and halt this.

[lynothehammer]

I ordered the Blu Ray from Planes TV, anyone received theirs yet ?

[Oldtower]

I believe some have rec'd their copies of the show dvd.. i guess the rest will do soon.

2012 marks the Stations 80 years of existence... so (Neil) will be marking this occasion possibly..

[Sea King]

3rd of July, is the release date on the PlanesTV website?