RAF Leuchars Airshow 2012...

 Despite it blowing a `Hooly` (Scottish for very windy) and no trains running east of Edinburgh due to rail work it was a great Airshow, Dave G and son Jamie joined myself and a drive into Edinburgh and got the train to Leuchars, 11.30am and it was quite busy...but would reach a 35,000 crowd by mid afternoon, but plenty of room for everyone with the ground space spread along a runway. Sadly the show faced into the sun on a very hazy day so air pictures and film was not very good...

Roll the pics...

Euro Fighter; Now stationed at Leuchars, we get these flying over work daily, but today will get to see what they really can do...

F16 single seat...

And dual seater...

A great day for kids with lots of hands on stuff...

E-3D Sentry...

VC 10...

Tornado GR4...

 B-52 static display, The Cold War monster... and one of the displays of most interest to myself, more on these planes in a bit...

Tornado GR4...

General Electrics Lightning. Basically a rocket with some wings and fuel tank!, awesome machine...

REME...

1745 Government troops...

Landrover 101...

A piece of history with an amazing history...

Desert Rats Willys Jeep...

Browning 30mm...

BSA Bantam..

Bren...

Thomson...

Feel lucky punk?...

Series 1 Landy...

Austin Champ...

Gulf war 110 Landy...

NATO Army Lightweight...

Linx...

Bunkers -Cold War era...

Dispersal hangers...

Hawker Hurricane...

Red Arrows...

E-3D Sentry...

 Avro Vulcan...

Huey...

Chinook, this was nuts to watch...

The other B-52 here in the UK for the weekend doing a flypast...

Nam time; Huey and Loach...

De Havilland Vampire`s...

Back to the B-52 static display, fenced off and only Air Cadets, Army cadets underneath with its crew i waved a crew member over to find out about the plane as the crowds started to leave after the Jubliee flyby. The B-52 was a 1961 craft which served in bombing raids over Vietnam and one of two that arrived for the weekend from Barksdale,  Louisiana, USA  They are two of around Eighty B-52s kept air worthy at Barksdale Base under the  Air Force Global Strike Command

You can see the Airbase on Google Earth...

B-52s...

The crewman said the plan  is to keep the B-52s flying to 2045, they deft have enough spares if you look at the Boneyard near Tuscan, Arizona, on Google Earth...

B-52s, some with wings guillotined off...

`Any Chance of some pics underneath?` i asked with a big grin...

`yeah go ahead`

If you don`t ask you don`t get -:)

After a few minutes it was flooded with people under neath the plane, but i got some pics first... -:)

I remember as a kid seeing  B-52s flying over East Lothian at high altitude on exercises in the early 1980s.
One day on summer hols i was with my dad at Yellowcraig and we watched twelve  B-52s  in formations of three flying in four rows flying at high altitude, there polished aluminium shining and air streams behind. There was a big NATO exercise that week  with ships and submarines out in the Forth Estuary and a lot of other aircraft flying about including Avro Vulcans and Nimrods. The B-52s were probably flying to Greenland.
I was in awe at them that day and every time i have seen any since...

Bomb Bay is massive...

Good info of these beasts of war on Wiki page;  B-52 Stratofortress

I did not shoot any video worth keeping but kept the B-52 flyby and made up a wee film, using the same Jimi Hendrix track played on the loud speakers as the plane soared over...



Vampire...

Red Arrows...

Nine Typoon Fighter Diamond Jubilee flyby closed the event...

Amazing day. It is unknown if the 2012 event will be the last airshow at RAF Leuchars as the base is probably going to be transferred to the Army in 2014...

Waiting on some good highlights film to appear on youtube by other spectators and will post more up as i find them...

Chinook..


B-52 landing at Leuchers 13/9/12...


Typhoon Jubilee diamond...