Outside Air Show tomorrow .

[dee]

We have been buzzed in Biggin Hill for a couple of days with a Dakota and a couple of Spitfires and a Hurricane.
We are just under the flightpath to one side, so watching some of the red arrows screaming around .
Years ago they would swoop down into the valley effectively dropping out of sight from the field but 'elf and safety put paid to that - being buzzed at really low level was treat - but too close and fast to photograph - especiallly as I had no idea when they would arrive .
The Special memorial show is £42.50 , whereas the normal yearly ticket for locals is £14 .
So -It's free bus pass up from the valley and grab a place on the main road opposite .
There are supposed to be 17 Spitfires in 3x groups setting off around before returning .
I was thinking a 80-300 lens , but if they are almost overhead in groups of 3 , I might be better off with one Sony fitted with the 35-80 [ 52-120 ].
No chance for practice though !!
Whatever the photographic outcome - having many Spitfires roaring overhead is going to be great .
dee

[Stephen]

Sadly it was the crash in 1980 of Don Bullock in his Douglas Invader that stopped any aerobatics over the valley at the end of the Biggin Hill Airfield. He had at several shows manoeuvred up out of the valley to give a dramatic appearance to the fly past. But in 1980, he turned after takeoff, and the plane rolled over into a nose dive into the valley. although all aboard the plane were killed, it did not hit any houses or cause further deaths, but a ban on passengers was introduced at airshows, and all flying over the valley has to be at normal flightpath approach altitude.
I was there that day and witnessed the appalling crash.
We get plenty of Spitfires and other WW2 planes here in Rochester, where a local company at Rochester airport services and restores them.

Stephen.