Southport Airshow, Great, Stunning, Awesome!!! (Attractions in Southport)

Member Name: ste231191

Product:	Attractions in Southport
Date:	11/09/05 (1819 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: planes, exitement, atmosphere everything!

Disadvantages: No red arrows

I have always loved planes all my life the power, thrust, speed everything about them and I especially love unique planes and air shows are the best places to go for the unique planes and today on the 10th of September was the Southport air show and was the perfect opportunity for me to go and watch a few of the best unique planes in the world. I have literally just got back in from the air show and I am on my computer writing a review on it because I think it was so stunning.

-*-*- A little history about the place -*-*-
Southport has been a great location for all the family since the Victorian times and I don't know how long the air show has been going but my Nan says when she was a child it was going and that was about 70 years ago, as I just mentioned Southport is a great place to go for all the family and Southport has a beach I admit it might not be the best in the world but it's a beach and that's where they hold the air show.

-*-*- Southport air show… oh and the army. -*-*-
Southport air show has been for the past few years connected with the army but it has always been Southport Air show, this year was no different except for the official name, this year its called Southport Air show and military display and boy do they live up to their name. First off, I'm sure there was a lot more army people on the ground than there were spectators! Also on the ground there is normally stalls and stuff but this time there was a few stalls but most of the beach was taken up by army tanks, weapons and firing ranges. Now obviously I didn't complain at this (and before I go any further, if I use the term "army" I mean the TA, navy, air cadets all sorts.)The army had a whole range of things to do on the ground including freefalling (well actually it's not freefalling but it really does feel like it.), they had a lot of paint balling ranges, abseiling, rock climbing go into tanks and a whole load of things to do.

-*-*- Other stuff on the ground -*-*-
There was other stuff to do on the ground apart from going on all of the army stuff they had to offer the other things include winning a greatly oversized cuddly toy and you have to buy tickets and make 21 or something I didn't have ago at that because it is really expensive. Another popular thing on the ground was a few exhibitions they had to offer, a few of them were quite interesting if you went in but others was a great waste of time. If you live in the north-west area then you might of heard of a radio station called rock fm and they had there their thunder truck there, where they broadcast live from there and they had a live stage set up and had different bands playing which was quite good, And obviously on the ground there are cafés and little burger vans but as you may expect these are a bit expensive so if you do go I recommend you take a packet lunch or a little picnic style thing, I will give you an idea of the prices like £1.50 for a can of coke £2.50 for a portion of chips that are really little and £4.50 for fish and chips but the fish is like 15 cm long very tiny.

-*-*- Time to kick off with the air show -*-*-

If you do decide to got o the show the actually show starts at 9am which is quite early but for three hours there are model planes whizzing about all over the place but they are quite cool to watch but after a while they can get quite a bit boring. The main part of the show starts around 12ish (the main part is the real aeroplanes.) Today on the Southport air show there was the following aircraft doing demonstrations:

Sea King - This aircraft is a helicopter and came to the show a few times for demonstrations. This aircraft belong to the army and as you can expect they would be doing a little more than just flying a helicopter and taking it to its limits, the helicopter was picking up vehicles (organized vehicles) and moving them to the other side of the beach, they were letting down ropes and soldiers were dropping out of them and then climbing back up to the chopper this was an amazing sight. The army really did a good job with this demonstration.

The blue arrows - You may not of heard of these before, well its almost a certainty that you haven't because these guys are quite new. As this is an air show you would expect to see things in the air wouldn't you? Well you did but these guys were on the ground, they were stuntmen on Suzuki Endoro machines (A very fast motorcycle.) They were phenomenal they were very daring. They first drove very close to each other first of all then they added small ramps and went very close to each other in the air. And then they progressed to larger ramps which by this point were really amazing and if that's not enough just to add the icing on the cake they set them on fire! And guess what? These lads were army lads just proves that the army is great place to be.

Local Competition - As I mentioned earlier this was meant to be air show there was another thing that was on the ground and surprise surprise it was the army again which was organizing this. It was a running race between Liverpool, Manchester and Bolton and it was dead easy all they had to do was run across the beach and the first one to run a mile won for there town. Oh yeah I forgot to mention they were pulling a three tonne gun behind them as well and it was a race. And I'm not going to tell you who won.

RAF Falcons - This for me was one of the highlights of my day the RAF Falcons, these were greatly talented group of people who jumped out of a Hercules plane which is a very big one, and opened their parachutes and fell from the skies to the beach in formation which was a truly stunning sight to watch. Another thing which was good about this was that they played James Bond music which was a nice touch.

Sea Vixen - This was the first fast and loud plane that came to the show and it was a great plane to watch the sea vixen. The Sea Vixen was made in France and it sponsored by Red Bull it is a stunning plane because it is very streamline and I also liked this because of its unique end because its connected together (you will see what I mean if you look at the pictures later.) The maximum speed of the great sea vixen 661 knots and if you don't know how to convert that let me do it for you…..VERY FAST!
Harrier GR7 - This plane has been around for almost 30 years now (not this specific one but harrier in general) and people are saying that this beast is getting a bit too old to fly. In my opinion I think it has another 30 years flying it is such a great air craft. This was another great part of the day because of its ability to do a range of things including turn 360 degrees each way the power of the beast the noise it crease with its massive engines the ability to take off vertically and drop bombs (but they obviously didn't do that here)

Wing Walkers - The famous world war bi-planes are great things you know what they say the old ones are the best and this plane is no exception apart from that they are painted with the utterly butterly logo and there are girls standing on the wings doing summersaults and all sorts of funny stunts hence the name wing walkers. This was not the best part of my day but this was certainly one of the highlights and was very amusing to watch.

Hawk T1 - This has also been a great plane (as you can probably see I like a lot of planes) but the hawk was a very very loud and fast plane, in fact the top speed of the hawk aircraft is 622mph which is very fast another factor of this plane that I liked is the decoration of the flame on the nose of the plane and when its coming at you it really looks special.

Sukhoi SU26 - Before I went to the air show I had never heard of this plane before but I decided through its act that this was another great plane. This is not a very fast plane but is an aerobatic plane and it done very good stunts you may of seen some aerobatic planes do the normal tricks like loops and soaring up high and turning the engine off but this one apart from doing all that was a special show because of one trick, and that trick was he soared high and used the eject seat and you saw one of the captains come down with a parachute whilst the other took control of the plane. This plane is sponsored by Honda which is a good manufacturer.

The jaguar - This WAS the best bit of the day the famous jaguar. I have known this aircraft for a long time and this plane attracted people from all over the UK to come. As I mentioned earlier the army was at the air show and as the jaguar was a fighter plane they combined forces and the army had planted mines underneath the sand. Just as the jaguar flew over where the mines had been planted the army let them off and can I tell you this was totally stunning a simulated bombing timed to perfection from the pilots and the army team there was black smoke around for ages and this was the best part of the day.

-*-*- Other parts of the day + disappointments of the day -*-*-
Obviously there was a lot more aeroplanes flying around but I didn't see them all because I was probably somewhere else like at expeditions or something. The biggest disappointment of the day was definitely the red arrows not being there as they were on the Sunday. And what's an air show without the red arrows? Well, although the (red) arrows were not there it was still a truly great an amazing show and I would recommend to everyone!

-*-*- Event partners -*-*-

Pleasureland - Next to the beach is a fairground with the world famous TRAUMAtizer and a few other great rides. This year was the first official year the pleasureland was the official sponsors and they done various offers like if you go to the air show get a wristband half price, but then you won't have the fun of watching all of the planes, in the program they also had a few offers that you could tear out.

Rock FM - I have briefly described who rock FM are earlier, they are a radio station based in Preston, the station is very popular around the North - West but the station is like marmite you either hate it or love it and I for one love it. They played a great part in the organization of the air show because they providing live acts for those who didn't want to watch the planes (why wouldn't they want to watch the planes?) But anyway they really did help a lot.

Army - I think I have talked about the army more than I have planes in this review and I'm sure you can gather from what I have said from the letting people control big machinery, freefalling, and the simulated bombings that the army have played a really big part in this well done.

There was other event partners like local newspapers the council and so forth and I'm sure they helped make it all happen. I would just like to say from me thank you for making my day.

-*-*- The prices -*-*-
As I'm sure you have gathered the show was a big success and I'm sure they made a lot of money too because of the prices for things. It was £6 for a pedestrian to get in and £22 for a car and all of its occupants. And the programme was £3. So the prices was a bit high but it was all well worth it.

-*-*- My conclusion -*-*-
I'm sure I don't need to write anything in this section because I have said it all in the review but I will conclude. I thought this was one of the best air shows that I have ever been too, I can tell a lot of hard work has gone into this show and I could tell. I would recommend this to anyone and everyone, I hope you have enjoyed reading this review as I have re-living the memories of a few hours ago. That's all I have to say I'm afraid, apart from I hope to see you there in 2006 a great day out for all the family.

Once again thanks for reading

Ste231191 ©

Summary: This is the best air show I have been to in my life.