Success is getting what you want; happiness is liking what you get

Monday 14 November 2011

Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines

It was a “boys day out” on Saturday 12/11/2011 for Robin, Peter and Derek when they took themselves off to the Remembrance Day WW1 Air Show at Hood Aerodrome, Masterton, which commemorated the signing of the Armistice on the 11/11/1945.  As well as all kinds of aircraft on show, the world famous “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” car from the film of the same name was offering rides with the proceeds going to women’s refuge charity.  Sir Peter Jackson (Director of Lord of the Rings trilogy) had recently purchased this car to add to his collection. The car is so called as the original engine installed made a sound like “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang”.

PB120444 Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

The day started with a parachute jump followed by a biplane diving back through a ribbon that it had dropped and cutting the ribbon with its propeller and it managed to do this three times before it became to low to attempt. This was to hard to capture a photo of.

Some of the selection of WW1  aircraft that have either been restored or recreated by a volunteer group called the Old Stick & Rudder Company follow:

PB120445Sopworth Triplane

PB120473Famous Sopworth Camel Scout 

PB120483Fokker DR 1 Dreidecher Triplane (Of Red Barron Fame)

Also on show were vintage vehicles including a replica WW1 tank which was giving rides to all and sundry. I knew it was a replica when I was able to see inside  and saw a “Caterpillar” Diesel  engine.  Also the touch was not quite metallic, however it still looked the part.

PB120466 

PB120490

They later tried to flour bomb the tank from “Tiger Moths” with absolutely no success!

PB120498

There were also a selection of vintage cars, motor bikes and replica vehicles that had been pressed into war service such as a London Double Decker Bus, and a mobile anti aircraft gun.

It was a good afternoon out as all the aircraft were airworthy and were flown at some stage of proceedings. It was just a pity about the weather as it started to rain as the flying started. I will have to look out for this show next year and hopefully the weather will be better.

1 comment:

Jenny and Robin said...

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