"Aero L-39 Albatros"
Winston Salem, NC - September 2009 (Click to embiggen)
Hosted by Written Inc.
"Grumman F14-D Tomcat"
Winston Salem, NC - September 2009 (Click to embiggen)
Hosted by Written Inc.
"MX Aircraft MX2"
Winston Salem, NC - September 2009 (Click to embiggen)
Hosted by Written Inc.
If you thought 900 photos in 3 days at Topsail Island was excessive, you should have been along for my trip to the Winston Salem Air Show in September. Try
1200 shots in three
hours. There was a lot of repetition I'll admit, but it seemed that there was no direction I could turn and
not find something to point the camera at. Shortly after I (finally) arrived, a pair of Czech-built Aero L-39 Albatros trainers looking for all the world like those fake MiG's in
Top Gun started buzzing the field with the PA announcers trying their very best to sound Russian. With a North Carolina drawl. It was amusing. The F-14 in the center frame wasn't up there with Tom Cruise and Anthony Edwards
flipping off battling the evil fake MiG's, though. this one was sitting quietly on the ramp as a static display. (There was, however, an F-15E fly-by earlier in the day. I saw them go over as I sat in traffic waiting to get to the airport.) On a less bellicose note, two time World Champion stunt pilot Rob Holland dazzled the crowd with a show in his tiny MX2 stunt plane. The MX2 has a carbon fiber skin over an airframe that's rated to
+/- 12 G's. And you can have your very own starting at around $350,000 USD. Equipped the way this one is, you can probably tack on another 60 G's -- the kind you pull out of your wallet, not out of a turn. There was a homegrown feeling to this demo however, since MX Aircraft is based in North Wilkesboro, NC (my sister in law's hometown) less than an hour's drive from Winston Salem. The punch line? Despite all those G-forces, when Holland egressed the aircraft other than a helmet and a parachute he was dressed just like I was. Shorts and t-shirt. That's what you call acclimated to high-G maneuvers.
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