Red Arrows Falmouth 31st May 2014

[Spitfire]

Today at Gyllingvase Beach Falmouth - The Reds 1st display of their 50th anniversary season ...


Ladies and Gentlemen the RAF Aerobatic team for 2014 is proud to present ... THE RED ARROWS



and ...Pulling up ...



A new shape .. Palm



Palm a bit further on ...



Precision over the sea in a beautiful sky



and of course - the heart ... on my wife's 61st birthday



stunning shapes in a blue sky



They only got back to the UK yesterday from Cyprus ....

'Sybille' the Classic Airforce Dragon Rapide takes the salute as they arrive in Newquay to stay overnight



The new fin design this year ...



The Blues see them out on their way to Falmouth




Well done chaps - a stunning first performance

[Aceyone]

Great pics,thanks for posting,look forward to seeing them soon !

[Jigsaw]

Great shots

[Mayfly]

Thanks Spitfire, there were many reports about them returning back to Scampton. What are their new manoeuvres for this season?

[Spitfire]

Well up until Saturday I hadn't seen the reds perform a FULL display for well over 10 years - and as I don't get to see them too often I had only seen ROLLING or FLAT due to weather ... so I suppose a lot of them were new to me

I particularly liked PALM as a shape - as pictured above - but the one that impressed me as a technically difficult manoeuvre was Enid doing a semi circular bending turn trailing white - arriving towards the crowd from right and leaving away from the crowd to the left - then one Arrow trails red and rolls around their smoke but he has to follow their curving turn as he rolls ... pretty good flying to keep it tight ... and a very good smoke effect with a white column wrapped in a red twist

Some of the splits are good and the best one is the GYPO coloured smoke split coming towards the crowd at low level - we all know there is staggered separation before they split but from the front it looks spectacular and the vast majority who are watching wont know about the stagger.

I do miss the final 9 ship split they used to do as an over the crowd end of display bomb burst - there are no 9 ship splits now ...

I do like the ENID & GYPO idea as it keeps the display much slicker in that there is always something happening - in the old 7 ship and synchro pair there were sometimes delays - but now its all action from all angles

The precision is as good as ever and the crowd on the beach burst into spontaneous applause several times in the display - and there were several big gasps at the splits ...

One thing I did enjoy was that the end of show break is normally IT ... but RED 10 told us they would reform and do a full left to right Diamond Nine as a 50th tribute ... that was nice ...then they disappeared ....and that was 'the end' .... BUT ... after the commentary finished - and unbeknown to everyone ...they had obviously done a huge bending turn out to sea and 5 minutes later they came towards us low - nose lights on - and just before they got to us - SMOKE ON - GO - and overflew us on the beach in Diamond Nine ... that took my breath away as they were unusually low .....and then they departed .... BRILLIANT

I loved it - they are as stunning as they were 50 years ago when I first saw them ....

[Aceyone]

Two weeks to Biggin

[Spitfire]

Another thing that fascinates me is with the ENID / GYPO / SYNCHRO split action going on all over the place it's amazing how the single jets get back together 'behind the scenes' so to speak for the next shape ...

If you look around in the distance, whilst they're displaying, you do see the occasional puff of white smoke trailed by them as they are presumably identifying where they are to others who are formatting on them for the next shape ... there must be single jets all over the place doing 300/400 knots trying to get back to the next formation 'out of sight' ...

Amazing stuff I'm sure the general public never think of... but I'm aware of it all the time

[Ray C]

Nice shots David....looks like you got airfield side....?

[Spitfire]

Nice shots David....looks like you got airfield side....?

No - unfortunately those last few are not mine, they were nicked from the Newquay Classic Airforce Live Facebook page ...
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Classic-Air-Force-Live/528793810573435

Funnily enough though I have applied to them to become a volunteer fettler - so may have access like that next time ...

One of the jets went tech before the display whilst at Newquay so they had to use Red 10 (a non smoker) as Red 1 and shuffle Red 1's jet to another position ... it wasn't noticeable in the display as Red 1 rarely smokes.

Here's the one left behind with Blues all over it

[Mayfly]

The Reds are very polished when they display and it is hard work, I always get pleasure from watching them. A National treasure. I bet there are many who don't appreciate just how hard they do work.

[Ray C]

The Reds are very polished when they display and it is hard work, I always get pleasure from watching them. A National treasure. I bet there are many who don't appreciate just how hard they do work.

Also the loss of life in recent times....

[Spitfire]

The Reds are very polished when they display and it is hard work, I always get pleasure from watching them. A National treasure. I bet there are many who don't appreciate just how hard they do work.

I concur ... I once visited them at Scampton and was astounded by just how clean and tidy everything was in the Arrows section of the base.... in the maintenance hangar you could have eaten off the floor... and the tool boxes were works of art .. even the dye pumps were clean and that is the worst job the Blues have

Their precision and polish is to be applauded ...in everything they do

I remember watching them when Ray Hanna was leader - they were just as good then ... if a bit more gung ho