Hi Guys, aside from a busy summer on placement and study season well underway, I stole some time away to Australia to go to the Avalon Airshow. I was working there and was a guest of several major aerospace companies, including Airbus, Dassault and Honeywell, which I'll detail in later posts. Anyway, on with the show. From the 28th February through to 2nd March were trade days only, with public days being 3rd to the 5th March. I spent the trade days working, so didn't do much airshow watching or photography, although I met with a mate on 2nd March for a photo session in the afternoon. Saturday 4th March I was able to spend time photographing, as I left the airshow on Sunday, and I'll go into that in a separate post.
A synopsis of the airshow, firstly. For those of you not sure, Avalon is an aerospace industry exposition, like Farnborough or Paris, with the major industry firms being represented, with the RAAF taking centre stage and using the event as a marketing tool. For a major airshow of this nature, the flying display was disappointing, despite there being a quantity of fast jets and heavy military material to keep lovers of that stuff interested. By far the highlight was the USAF F-22, followed by the Republic of Korea Air Force Black Eagles aerobatic display team. There was a good reason why RoKAF took the Black Eagles to Avalon, the RAAF is looking at replacing its Hawk 127 fast jet trainers and KAI is marketing the T-50 Golden Eagle, publicly announcing a sale of the type to Poland during the show. Boeing spoke of the T-7A Red Hawk but missed a trick in not even shipping the static mock-up it took to Paris in 2019. Anyway, the flying comprised a lot of civil aerobatic displays, which leave me disinterested, so I avoided those and picked out times for breaks when they were on. Mine, and seemingly everyone else I spoke to's biggest complaint was the lack of warbird content, just a rather tame fly-by by a Spitfire and P-51, although there were a few light military trainers and an English Electric Canberra, which was great to see. This was disappointing as Australia has a big warbirds contingent and they all shied away from Avalon like the plague - insider talk speaks of airshow management being responsible for that. Anyway, some flying photos spread across the two different days when I was able to get out and use my camera.
USAF F-22:
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The image sizings are a bit odd as they are done that way for instagram, yes, I'm one of those, now... IG tag #that_tall_fella_with_the_hat
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In conjunction with Lockheed Martin, the RAAF brought out its F-35s at every opportunity. A small selection.
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I haven't been through all my Superbug images yet, but this was a popular view.
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The Royal Australian Navy had a starring role in demonstrating its MH-60R Romeos, with the NH/MRH-90 Taipans getting a lot of bad press at the moment as air forces around the world abandon the type. The army had a single Taipan in the static, whereas the navy has gotten rid of the type altogether.
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More to come...
A synopsis of the airshow, firstly. For those of you not sure, Avalon is an aerospace industry exposition, like Farnborough or Paris, with the major industry firms being represented, with the RAAF taking centre stage and using the event as a marketing tool. For a major airshow of this nature, the flying display was disappointing, despite there being a quantity of fast jets and heavy military material to keep lovers of that stuff interested. By far the highlight was the USAF F-22, followed by the Republic of Korea Air Force Black Eagles aerobatic display team. There was a good reason why RoKAF took the Black Eagles to Avalon, the RAAF is looking at replacing its Hawk 127 fast jet trainers and KAI is marketing the T-50 Golden Eagle, publicly announcing a sale of the type to Poland during the show. Boeing spoke of the T-7A Red Hawk but missed a trick in not even shipping the static mock-up it took to Paris in 2019. Anyway, the flying comprised a lot of civil aerobatic displays, which leave me disinterested, so I avoided those and picked out times for breaks when they were on. Mine, and seemingly everyone else I spoke to's biggest complaint was the lack of warbird content, just a rather tame fly-by by a Spitfire and P-51, although there were a few light military trainers and an English Electric Canberra, which was great to see. This was disappointing as Australia has a big warbirds contingent and they all shied away from Avalon like the plague - insider talk speaks of airshow management being responsible for that. Anyway, some flying photos spread across the two different days when I was able to get out and use my camera.
USAF F-22:
The image sizings are a bit odd as they are done that way for instagram, yes, I'm one of those, now... IG tag #that_tall_fella_with_the_hat
In conjunction with Lockheed Martin, the RAAF brought out its F-35s at every opportunity. A small selection.
I haven't been through all my Superbug images yet, but this was a popular view.
The Royal Australian Navy had a starring role in demonstrating its MH-60R Romeos, with the NH/MRH-90 Taipans getting a lot of bad press at the moment as air forces around the world abandon the type. The army had a single Taipan in the static, whereas the navy has gotten rid of the type altogether.
More to come...
