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Point Magu Airshow
Sunday, 8/8/10
Updated 8/9/10

We were planning to attend the air show for couple of weeks, but the weather was a bit questionable with continued low clouds all week, so we passed on Saturday.  Got out the door about 11 on Sunday .  Fortunately the clouds burned off on the drive to the Naval Airbase.  Spotted a C5 making some passes a few miles from the gate.  After we got inside we heard that Saturday's show had been limited to low altitude routines, but we had clear skies overhead on Sunday so flying was not curtailed by the weather.

Fee admission and parking.  Everything inside was pretty expensive, but we didn't buy anything other than spending a dollar to tour an old tandem rotor Piasecki H-21 helicopter.  The Piasecki is powered by a radial engine.  Built in 1957, it is the last one still flying with the original radial engine.  All the other military aircraft were free to tour, but some of the lines were excessivly long.  Better to pay a dollar and skip the lines.  We did check out one of the Seahawks, the Navy version of the Blackhawk.

Saw some old WW2 aircraft; a P51, Bearcat, Hellcat, B25, and Zero, plus some assorted Navy equipment from various eras.

They had the usual aerobatic routines from sport aircraft.  A single F18 Hornet that was impressively loud, and an A10 Warthog got the crowd going with a close air support ordinance delivery display.  A Redbull helicopter did  some impressive aerobatics after dropping it's load of skydivers.

No F18 Navy Blue Angles this year.  The main billing for the Naval Air Show was the Air Force F16 Thunderbirds.  I'd seen the Blue Angles before, but this was our first event watching the Thunderbirds.  Definitely an impressive display of calculated precision flying and speed.

General admission was free, but it cost a hundred dollars to sit up front in the VIP area.  After the show we went in to snap a photo of the Thunderbirds.  Spoke with the wife of a crewmember and met the base commander.

Traffic looked pretty bad on the way out but it flowed ok.  Took the boys on a short tour of the base and showed them the launch pad we used for the target drones when I worked for GE.

Polished off our snacks of fruit, power bars, and crackers, then stopped for an extra large fruit smoothie on the way home.  Dropped Noah off about 6:15.

/ Tom