The Art Deco Bomber: The AT-11

Continuing the trainer theme, there was a rare trainer on display at Thunder Over Michigan: The AT-11 Kansan.

The AT-11 was a Beechcraft Model 18 turned into a bomber trainer for training bombardiers, navigators, and gunners before they got to the big bombers during World War II.  Left all polished and shiny, and with red engine cowlings, this one is a flying work of art.

Named Three Hits and a Miss, this aircraft is a very pretty example of the type. A very nice and often overlooked and unrecognized World War 2 American aircraft.

There Were No Zombies At The Air Show, But There Was A Vampire

A DeHaviland Vampire to be exact.

The de Havilland DH.100 Vampire was an early British jet fighter.  With a top speed of 548 mph, and armed with 4 20 mm cannon and able to carry rockets and bombs, this 50's fighter served the British Air Force and Navy and 30 other countries' air forces, and went on in British service in a training role into the 60s.



 This is a very nice example of a Vampire.  Sadly it didn't perform as the Vampire power assisted takeoffs are a sight and sound to behold.



It also had some pretty cool nose art.

 A fine flying example of the second jet fighter aircraft to enter British service.

Some Fine Jets At The Show

Thunder Over Michigan had quite a few privately owned jet warbirds in all their glory on the field.

More on some of the jet stars later, but I really wanted to Czech a few out:

No, that's not another A-4 Skyhawk.

It's an L-39 Albatross.

A Czech advanced jet trainer, it was the mainstay of the Warsaw Pact Air Forces trainer fleets.

She's quite the beauty of a plane.

A two-seater with a top speed of 466 mph, a range of 683 miles without external tanks and 1,087, miles with externals and a service ceiling of 36,000 feet, she'd be my pick for a jet trainer warbird.  These birds are quite available at the moment and while out of my price range are relatively affordable.One day I'll get a pilot's license, build up time and one of these shall be mine.

The L-39s little brother was also present at the show - The L-29 Delfin.

Designed in the late 1950s as a jet trainer, the L-29 was a very effective 2-seat jet trainer.

With the L-29 having a top speed of 407 mph,  555 mile range, and service ceiling of 36,100 feet, grass field capability and currently going for much cheaper than the L-39s, she'd do nicely as well.

Unfortunately, neither the L-39 nor the L-29 performed during the show, but they sure were nice to look at and dream about.

The B-25 Beauties

Normally you're lucky to be at an air show and see a single flying  B-25 Mitchell bomber.

Thunder Over Michigan had two this year.

Georgie's Gal

and

Briefing Time

Back then planes had some serious nose art, as well as some impressive mission markings.

Both bombers at the show were beautiful aircraft.

The B-25 was an excellent medium bomber, famous for being the first plane to take the war to Japan's home islands in the storied Doolittle raid. It also served extensively in Europe, the Middle East, and Russia in addition to the Pacific.

Even today they make both a beautiful sight and lovely sound zipping across the sky:

A Rare Bird At Thunder Over Michigan

A rare bird made an appearance at the Air Show:

No, its not a Grumman S-2 Tracker.

It's the Grumman C-1 Trader.

The Grumman C-1 Trader is the COD (Carrier On Board Delivery) variant of the C-1 Tracker ASW aircraft.  Delivering personnel, supplies and mail (complete with a US Postal Service marking on the front landing gear cover), 83 Traders were built, and according to Wikipedia only 10 are left flying in private hands.

This was one of them.

The current owner was by the plane and spent quite some time telling us about it, especially after Murphy's Law mentioned his stop by the S-2 Tracker graveyard. We learned a lot about the bird from its owner who was quite the patient and gracious gentleman and the kids liked listening to him.  The seats for passengers face backwards so there is less stress on them during carrier landings.

He also posed the riddle: Why and how did so many Traders log more carrier landings than catapult shot takeoffs?

The answer is that these planes had sufficient power to take of from the carrier without the assistance of the catapult, and apparently a lot of pilots preferred leaving the carrier under their own control that way.

He was offering internal tours for $2 a pop so while ML and I continued to listen to him tell us all about the planes history and what its like to fly it, I sent Leah and Abby on a reconnaisance mission to scope out the interior of the plane and bring back pictures.

Off they went, and they did a good job:

They even did an interior video:

These kids took their aircraft documentation job seriously.

A beautiful plane, a gracious owner, and the kids got to explore a real piece of living history, and they highly enjoyed themselves.

Sequestration, And Airshows, And Ospreys, Oh My!

At Thunder Over Michigan some acts were very notable by their absence and thus will not be in any pictures.

There were no active military airshow exhibits or demonstrations.  No Blue Angels, No Thunderbirds, No A-10s from Selfridge ANG doing a flyby, and certainly no Ospreys flying demonstration flights and wowing the crowd with their impressive capabilities.

Due to sequestration and Obama's effort to make the most publicly painful cuts possible, there were no military demonstration teams attending airshows this year.

However, even with all the sequestration going on, there's still plenty funds available to fly Bo the Obama's Portugese Water Dog in his own Osprey to Martha's Vineyard to join the Obama family who already traveled there separately at taxpayer expense on their latest vacation.

Apparently the latest sign of being amongst the .01% is having a separate aircraft for delivering your family pets whilst you're on vacation.

Do note that the cost of just a couple of Obama's vacation junkets to the US taxpayer would likely fund a whole season of Blue Angels or Thunderbirds airshow exhibitions.

Thunder Over Michigan - Flight Of The Skyraiders

Thunder over Michigan had the largest gathering of flying Douglas A-1 Skyraiders of any Air Show and six were present and ready to perform.

Here's the Skyraiders on the flight line:

The Skyraider, brainchild of awesome airplane designer Ed Heinemann,was a workhorse of the US Air Force and Navy in the Korean and Vietnam Wars.  Designed to be a  replacement for the Navy's torpedo and dive bombers, it was able to carry up to 8.000 lbs of ordnance - More or equal to the carrying capacity of the B-17 Bomber.

Here's AD-1 Skyraider "Bad News" - take a look at all  that exhaust residue from running the Wright R-3350 radial engine on the cowling, and the (inert) ordnance on the wings.

The US Navy Skyraiders had folding wings for carrier operations

and variants had 4 seats.

 How do they stay so shiny? A lot of constant work:

This is a serious beast of a plane. It served the US Armed Forces very well indeed.  Skyraiders even shot down MIG-17s during the Vietnam war in addition to bombing and close air support missions and in its most famous role as "Sandys"- close air support during pilot rescues featured in many a movie.

They first had all the Skyraiders up in formation and then we were able to watch one of them make passes during the Vietnam reenactment, which was awesome as it came in low and fast:

 

The sound that engine made was magic.

The Skyraiders at Thunder Over Michigan were worth the price of admission alone, but there was lots more to see and do than just the Skyraiders.
 

Thunder Over Michigan 2013

Today I and the kids got up early and headed over to the secret location where Murphy's Law and the Spud spent the night.  Once we picked them up we headed out to the Willow Run airport and the Thunder Over Michigan Air Show.


Arriving as the gates opened, we got in line and headed in to a great show indeed.

In addition to aircraft ground and aerial displays, there were World War 2 and Vietnam era reenactments complete with an air assault from a Bell UH-1 "Huey" helicopter and plenty to see and do.

Thanks to Murphy's Law, we had earlier decided to upgrade to the Bomber Club seats and it was a wise choice.  Even though it was a cloudy day, the sun still beat down and having access to a tented area to rest in, seats, and all the water I could push on the kids to avoid dehydration helped a lot.

Lots more pics and posts on the subject later.

Getting out of the Air Show was a pain however with traffic way backed up not only due to volume but due to having road construction dropping the access road to one lane heading outbound. After an hour in traffic we finally made it to the highway, only to find more construction on northbound 275.

In short, it was a great day, the kids had an awesome time, we got to see some awesome airplanes and I'm wiped.