The hinge of my disappointment was the unannounced scratching of this year's headliner: Mig Fury - an aerial reenactment of a Korean War-era dogfight featuring a FJ-4 Fury (the carrier version of the venerable F-86 Sabre jet), a Mig 15 and a Mig 17.
These jets occupied a strange niche in air combat history, between the obsolescence of propellor-driven fighters and the ascension of missiles as the principal air-to-air weapon. These pilots fought in essentially the same way that Billy Bishop and Baron von Richtoffen did, but at close to Mach 1. I even had a title for the blog post: Gunfight at the Speed of Sound.
Sigh.
What really galls me isn't so much that the act was cancelled, as this happens fairly frequently at the intersection of aviation and show business, but that the show's organizers never bothered to let us know. The email they sent out that very morning listed Mig Fury as part of that day's lineup, and the announcer never mentioned it. My first clue that they wouldn't be showing up came at 3:45, when announced the T-33 demo would be the final act, ending the show almost a half-hour ahead of schedule.
Smoke in Idaho meant that three other WWII warbirds ended up scratched as well: the Hellcat, Wildcat and P-51 Mustang, which I know left a lot of vintage plane fans severely miffed.
The aerobatics displays that were substituted in their place were very well executed, but also kind of repetitive. For instance, we were treated to an amazing display by Buck Roetman in his Pitt's Special biplane, including his inverted tail cut of a ribbon held 14 metres off the ground (but not until after he had flown under it on the initial pass to size things up!). This was followed by Gary Rower in a vintage Stearman biplane in the style that had trained so many pilots in the early days of WWII. Later on, they placed both these planes in the air at one time, ostensibly to demonstrate their differences, but it still felt like a desperate attempt to fill an empty slot.
I will say this though: if you ever have the opportunity to see a fellow named Jim Bourke do his aerobatic display, do so without hesitation. He flies a modern Extra, specifically designed from the ground up to be an acrobatic all-star, and his display was absolutely breathtaking. The speed and precision with which he snaps and rolls his aircraft are dizzying to behold, and elicited several audible gasps from the crowd.
Another double up saw a Harvard trainer from Yello Thunder paired up with "Nancy" a 60 -year-old Nancheng from the PRC flying her very last show right here at Villeneuve.
On welcome addition to the lineup was this firefighting exercise.
And in addition to sporting some brilliant jetfighter livery, Precision Exotics actually gave air show patrons the opportunity to ride in or even drive either a Lamborghini or Ferrari on the runway. If it hadn't been $150, I might have done it (from the passenger seat, honestly - it's been a while since I've driven stick and I highly doubted these were automatics!). One of them even raced the T-33 in the finale.
The show closed with some elegant passes by "Acemaker." This T-33 , the training version of Lockheed's P-80 Shooting Star, was a treat to see, if only because it was the only jet we saw in the air besides the 737 that airshow sponsor Flair Air flew past us twice.
In the end, a bad day at the airshow is still better than an average day in the backyard, and I was grateful for the opportunity to see some aircraft up close and in their natural environment, even if I didn't see all the ones I wanted to. Besides, with the show close to cancellation due to the pervasive smoke in our region from the B.C. wildfires, it feels almost churlish to complain.
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