I have to share with you an amazing experience.

Can you fathom an F-18 on a low (20' AGL) high speed (680 kts) pass directly over you? Experienced it today at the Seafair Blue Angels display.

What a rush. Felt the heat from the engine followed by massive sort of shock wave. Thereafter smell of JP4.

Anyone with similar experience?

Had a Tiger Moth circling over my house at about 1000 ft yesterday... is that close enough?? :-)

Seriously, I think the most mind-blowing "similar" experience I've had was watching/ hearing the two B1 bombers depart from Fairford last week. The noise was out of this world - the HACAN people would have loved it!

Indeed .... from time to time I get away sailing on the Myall Lakes, north of RAAF Williamtown in Australia .... in the middle of their training area ...

I have no idea of the rules, but I presume that OCU students have a respectable limit with FCIs having more latitude .....

Oftentimes, after exercises doing whatever it is that training fighter pilots do, there is the semi-obligatory matter of targets of opportunity runs on any boats on the upper lake system ....

The best was some years ago ... I was sailing downwind with my feet up while the kids did all the work .. as fathers ought to be able to do from time to time ...... I saw the F18 come around the end of the particular section of the river we were on and approach the yacht astern in a quiet glide of sorts ..... he went past ... fast ... below mast height ...... got the attention of four wide-eyed kids like you wouldn't believe ..... when the taps were opened up ..... the vertical climb was more than impressive ....

Common experience on the lakes ......

In the early 70's when Ray Hanna was leading the Reds in the Gnats. I went up to the club the day after BoB day at Biggin Hill. The Reds were still there. I had my then 5 year old daughter with me and my wife. It was apparent that the Reds were getting ready to go.

So, waiting at the Main Road end, they flew off and then came back in a 'broken' 9 at anything from 'God knows what' up to about 30' and all hell broke loose. My little girl ran in every direction there was and my wife stood in absolute shock. I ducked! But what magic. Never seen anything like it since.

A long time ago, eight RNZAF Skyhawks were staging back to Ohakea through RAAF Williamtown. I was a lone Navy Skyhawk pilot on detachment to Willy.
After a raucous Saturday night in the mess, the Kiwis departed in two divisions of 4 early on Sunday morning. As the Kiwis are known for some spirited flying, I wandered off to the departure end of the runway to watch.
No 4 in each division was a TA4 carrying an extra D tank to make up for the small internal fuel cell. Everybody was probably close to MTOW as these guys had a long way to go. The aircraft rolled with ten seconds separation.
The last guy off suffered masses of hot air, and had to turn as he got airborne to cut the corner. He cleared the barrier by about ten feet, already rolling into a turn.
Exhilarating to watch, but must have been sweatbomb material for the last guy.
:cool:

Can't remember exactly where or when, but it was on a beach a while ago, at an airshow -- probably Essex, given where I was living at the time it must have been. Late 80s or early 90s, certainly.

We'd seen a lot of nice hardware doing a lot of clever stuff. Then there was a loud noise out to sea, which became very loud indeed. Then there was a Vulcan. Then there was the loudest noise I ever heard in my life, as said device strolled overhead. Then there was a much louder noise, as it got bored with being so close to the deck, pointed upwards and went away.

Must have been one of the last outings for that frankly implausible machine. I do hope one of the various Vulcan restoration groups gets one up in the air again.

R

SLF.. Hear! Hear! Fantastic machine the Vulcan. Remember them in the early days at Farnborough; what a machine!

Sorry Mate that Tiger Moth might have been me!, But if you were working at the time you saw it, I'm not admitting to anything!!!:D

Not quite that dramatic, but was lucky enough to see an awesome display by a Harrier GR7 recently. This included ‘flying’ at about 10kts 100 yards or so off Southend seafront, then reversing, then going sideways. Ear splitting & jaw dropping.

(Unfortunately, it’s probably the same machine that’s just gone for a swim in the North Sea. :( Thank God no-one hurt.)

John Tullamarine

I know what you mean about being "targetted"

I was on my way home one summers evening on a reasonably deserted stretch of road in Gloucestershire when 2 A10s based at the local MU in Kemble crossed over at about 150' one of which peeled off in a wide arc and commenced his "run" on my car at about 50' . I knew what he was up to so flashed my headlights at him ....he acknowledged with the the obligitory wing waggle.

Had I been quicker on the uptake I should have got my colleague in the front seat to take the rolled up projector case from the back seat and point it out the sunroof at the second guy that did the same thing!! I'd love a gauge his reaction as the innocent member of the public driving along points, what appears to be a blow pipe missile at him! although the effect of his 30mm cannon on my car would have been enough to spoil my day....

My two pennorth.
RAF Buchan, April 1963..Two Buccs flew UNDER the Type 80 radar:D
RAF Fynningly BoB 1967....Vulcan Scramble..IMC for 5 mins after;)
Manchester Airport.....
1. Red Arrows Formation TO
2. F16 display [before ] Barton
3. Post Barton diplay by F3 Lightning:D :D :D
4. RAF Patrington [a Radar unit] was" beaten up" by F6 Lightnings of the FCDU Binbrook on disbandment [mid '67 I think] They flew below rooftop level:D except we lived in single storey chalet type buildings:eek: :D
we aim to please, it keeps the cleaners happy

..and the days of the "real" Farnborough Air Shows. The commentator (Oliver Stewart) screaming "and he's coming in over the Laffans Plain end nudging mach 1..." "He" would be below the height of the spectators in front of you so all you knew was when the noise wrecked your ears a second after he'd gone! The Vulcan Olympus test bed was quite a shaker too...

Was on a last minute holls to Zakynthos in jun/jul 1993.

Whilst thoroughly bored on a round the island turtle tour, we were cruising between a cliff face and a small island, its peak being approx 100 asl, distance from cliff face to island being no more than 100 ft, the sea being quite choppy with approx 15 feet of swell when I spotted a small dot on the horizon directly infront of the vessel...

This dot was pointed out to a colleague and a brief joke was made about the seagul (theres one, theres another one etc..), when all of a sudden we realised that this seagul was travelling at speed, and getting bigger and bigger every split second...

There was no time to reach for the cameras, as this Aircraft, which we think may have been a Fiat/ Alpha jet or something similar, was directly on a collision course with us. And moving... FAST!!

We watched in amasement as the approaching aircraft, which we estimated to have been no more than 40 asl, flew on with no variation in heading....

Moments later, this aircraft being almost on top of us, the pilot realised that we were occupying the same space between island and cliff face, and rolled violently to port. The very moment the roll stopped the aircraft passed over and along side of us. The pilot did have a startled look on his face, a very startled look and very very BIG EYES!! He passed over usat no more than TEN feet clearence in height!! ( this was less than the distance from the top of the mast to our top deck position the mast being 12 ft tall!!)

As the aircraft passed over us and to our right between the island (no more than 50 feet between us and the island!) there followed the jet blast an incredible noise and a diaphram shaking like never before... clutching to bags and towels as the jet wash attempted to remove everything from the deck, including us!! (well it felt like it!!) We looked aft and saw this plane climb steeply towards two con-trails which were passing overhead at a range of about five miles... Beleived to be Phantoms, and a few seconds later we lost sight of him...

This was the highlight of the tour and we asked the captain how he managed to arange such a flypast for us, but the humour was lost in the translation.......

We didn't see any turtles on the tour, but I bet the Pilot did sitting there in the cockpit!!

Back in the mid-80's, in RSA, a friend and I were out jollying in a C172 near the Kruger Park. This was fairly close to the main strike airfield for the SAAF in that part of the world at Hoedspruit.

We were rather suprised when a pair of Mirages hurtled by not more than a couple of hundred feet away from us and then went screaming up into the sky. Fairly shook the C172 up, and, needless to say, we were quite shaky of hand as well.

Saw film once of a Buccaneer (magic!) having a go at a pretend sam site during an exercise Red Flag. Sequence filmed from aforesaid location. Desert dust coming up from the wingtip vortices. Low? I`ll say!

Loki

I know the clip you mean, it is rumoured to be out on the net somewhere, does anyone have the URL ?

PA-28

Find it strange that as "Sonic" car alarms became popular in the early '90's then XH558 was taken from the airshow circuit.That final Vulcan"Full thrust" pull up at the end of it's routine was music to ones ears and the aftermath was the "chorus of the car park" for a couple of minutes as every car alarm within a mile or so trumpeted its departure. Pure magic:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

Firstly, on the Vulcan ... At the Bournemouth Air Show 1988 or 89, it's take off was the most fabulous bellyaching scream from a herd of tortured cows. The others in my party were holding their hands over their ears but I did not want to dim that sound. It rotated to the most ridiculous angle and went off like the proverbial bat out of hell.

This is borrowed from Tech Log, were there is a current thread about start up sequence ... Never flew a Vulcan when 'Mass Rapid' starts were allowed - but we still had the 'combustor' facility on most of them in the late 70s. You parked the throttles at the 50% position, selected rapid start and pressed the 4 start buttons in succession. An uncontrolled fuel/air explosion in the engine combustors spun up the engines in no time at all, as soon as they'd started and the gennies were on you started the PFCUs, 8 seconds later they'd all be running. You briefly cycled the throttles back to idle, then selected full power, turned left a few degrees off the ORP and thundered down the runway. 10-15 minutes later you'd be passing 40 000ft, still climbing...
Now that must have been a sight for sore ears :cool:

As to Harriers, I can relate a story of late father. In his retirement, he lived in the hamlet of Mothercombe on the coast about 17 miles east of Plymouth. He had made friends with a Harrier training captain who was based at Wittering, where my father was in the war. Subsequently, the man wrote the forward to dad's book.

For one training operation ... the crews had been advised that a nasty foreign dictator had escaped to England and was holed up in Mothercombe. Further, the 'gen' was that the 'dictator' and his floozy (my step mother!) would be taking tea on the lawn at a certain time on a certain day. ;)

The three Harriers arrived from the sea (south) and identified the cottage where the dictator was staying by the large table cloth that was spread on the lawn for 'tea'.

The Harriers passed over the collection of cottages in the single cul-de-sac road and then turned to make sure that they had fully destroyed the place.

Turning back from the sea again, they 'saluted' and roared off back to Wittering. According to my step mother, the villagers jumped out of their skins and could not understand why my father was grinning for a week. :D :D :D

... what an absolutely delightful tale ..... totally restores one's confidence in the war machine system, doesn't it ? I can only imagine the initial run over the village ..... presumably at something considerably less than an appropriate height ?

At an airshow in Belgium yesterday (forgot the name of the place, tiny private airfield) with a rather respectable flight display. The award for "nosiest fcuker" went to the USAF B1B who came in very low on a downwind, lit the burners and pulled up. Impressive sound set. It did strike me a bit odd though, as he pulled up and rolled left begining what looked to be a 360 roll. But reaching inverted, he reversed his roll. Q: Does the USAF have a rule that prevents B1 crews from doing a 360 roll, whereas 2 x 180 is approved?

Most impressive off all was this french guy, a Mr D. Lapparent, and his SU26. This guy is most certainly certifiable, and what little understanding I thought I had of aerodynamics went down the drain. Apparently, nothing beats a big engine and a massive prop! For fecks sake, this guy traversed sideways with an AoA of, say, 80° at something like 10kts. He also took the SU26 straight up and then throttled back (I could hear the engine rev'ing down!) and just hung there. Throttled back a bit more and descended vertically still pointing straight up, then added power and climbed! I can't even describe the things he did with his flying machine. Amazing, and nothing will convince me that he didn't have an anti-gravity device installed somewhere. Did make the subsequent F16, Mirage 2000, Tornado etc. displays seem rather boring.

John_T, glad you liked it :)

My only complaint was that dad had not told me about it in advance - if he had, I would have been in Devon faster than the Harriers!!!!

I cannot recall the height but Mothercombe is on a steep sided hill, the land slopes down to the sea very rapidly. So, as they shot over the the houses (dropping their munitions!) they would have had to be pulling back very strongly. Come to think of it, the attack run would have had to have been started from a position below the street (close to sea level) and then be climbing steadily throughout. 'Appropriate' height might have been mentioned at the briefing but not considered thereafter!

Again, if I recall correctly (this was about five or six years ago) two of the a/c were attacking and the the third was the Taining Capt (He is a Grp Cpt now) to observe. So three of them at zero altitude must have been simply glourious.

To paraphrase Roger Bacon, ahhhhhhhh NOISE:) :) :)
I was lucky enuff to be at RNAS Lossie in 1963 for "Navy Day" when SIX Scimitars went past at Warp7:D :D
Also at RAF Finningly in '67-'68 [can't remember] when we had the Full Monty "VULCAN Scramble":D :D :D :D
The runway was IMC for about 10 mins:) Oh Happy days
we aim to please, it keeps the cleaners happy

A least 2 memorable experiences....

1. Camping just in the saddle next to Mt Kosciuszko (Australia's highest hill") tending the little trangia stove, when I heard a shout from the person sitting next to me. Looking up, the sky was filled with a FA-18. The first noise came a split second later - he was moving....

2. Standing on a small hill on the Norwegian highlands. Looking at the wonderful autumnal colours, I spied two small dots, getting bigger as they moved towards us. they were Norwegian A.F. F16s, as as they hamered past, slightly below us, but only a few metres away, one of them waved.

.. brings to mind a superb solo display from a few years back ...

Airshow in country Victoria (Australia) ... all very predictable but OK .... the finale was an RAAF ARDU Miracle which was first seen holding out at a modest distance .. making a little smoke ... as the assembled crowd ambled off to their various velocipedes ...... in he came .. and as the roar rolled across the field, the crowd ... in a wave which followed the sound .... turned to witness the following 10 minutes of delightful idiocy ....

Cloudbase was probably 800 feet at the time ..... the display included all the usual things one expects from a Mirage ... including loops into the cloud and bottoming out at, I guess, no more than 15-20 feet above the runway ..... multiple twinkle rolls ... including a few with three or four rolls which I have been told is a no-no due to roll-yaw coupling ..... during one of these (and they were all at a sufficiently low height to see the terrain above the aircraft's flightpath) he got caught and, for a moment, my heart was in my mouth .. but he recovered and got away with it ....... in the end ... they must have radioed to tell him to "go away" .. or words to that effect .... I am sure he was just going to keep enthralling the multitude there present until he got down to bingo fuel .....

Closest I ever got was Stefan Karwowski (I think) in Spencer Flack's beautiful red single seat Hunter - it was at a Dunsfold Families Day, either 81 or 82 and we were at the extreme eastern end of the display line - he came curving in from the east and slightly behind us , in the turn to hit the display line and - just - clipped the crowd line - knife edge, pratically overhead, low and fast - wow! Not fast enough for the blue note (though else where on this forum someone said only certain marks achieved it), but awesome nonetheless - and a big buffet from the wake turbulence...

Also at Biggin '83 on the Friday just to the west of the 03 threshold on the main road watching the arrivals. Someone, probably John Watts or Mark Hanna arrived in the OFMC Pilatus P-2 and proceeded to beat up the airfield, coming towards me with the prop arc seemingly at head height - despite an 8 foot fence between me and the aircraft I felt the urge to duck. He cleared me by a good few feet though!

Incidently, I always used to pay one day at Biggin and watch the show from the road the next - a few times while standing there I saw people right under the approach get the lunch scared out of them by a Tornado or similar coming over the road at bus-top height under reheat...

And I saw a good pic of Ken Ellis spreadeagled at Bembridge as Ray Hanna's P-40 passed a dozen or so feet above his head!

Those of you familiar with the Dovey Loop in Mid Wales will know the route from the Cross Foxes pub and down towards the sea over the Talyllyn Lake. It is a steep sided valley with a long road on the side.
A few years ago, I was sat on my Honda VF750 at a traffic light (roadworks) facing up the valley, when a Phantom F4 came at 90* through the top gap at about 20' and leveled out below the level of the road. I flashed my headlamp at him as he came towards me (v. fast) and as he flew past the Nav looked at me and a white goved hand gave me the V sign as they sped past about 40 feet away. WOW! Silly grin day or what?

Honington, late 70s. Visiting Vulcan crew are heartily peed off with being called 'V-force w***ers' by the Bucc mob for the previous 2 days, so decide to go home in style from the static display. Get airborne with full power, turn downwind at 150ft, climbing to 500ft. Then come back along the southern taxiway at 350KIAS and 50ft on the rad alt, then over the main parking area before flying between the tower and 12 Sqn's hangar. Then up into the climb with a wingover at 150 deg angle of bank onto course back to Scampton - and the biggest bollocking we.....err, I mean they ever got.

But it impressed the punters..... But not our....err, their Wg Cdr!!

Measles rock, Mount Alice.

B****r 20ft, 10ft would have stretched it on a couple of occasions. (Best, however, was FIGAS who did a touch and go on the helipad just to show who was best. Not bad for an Islander)

And the last 3 ship F4 flypast when the F3s took over and the F4s were scrapped on site. The cloud base was low over the hill and the F4s climbed the side, rolled and pulled through and all you could see was the faces looking down from the cockpits, waving, as with only their canopies visible below the cloud base, they pulled through and thundered down the far side of the hill.

Mind you, I would love a copy of THE low pass at Alice by a certain pilot, if someone has a copy after all these years?

Yes - that is indeed an impressive video. Can't help thinking that not all of it was intended to be that low though. Particularly after he flies over the site and is still descending below the top of the mountain on the far side.....

(Sorry, don't have a copy. Saw it years ago on my EWO course when someone put it on the VCR!)

Yeah.....Vulcans.

BoB day, Biggin 74, I think. Approaching across the field towards the crowd (no woosy restrictions then), gear down, doors open. Clean up, nose up, noise up, straight up.

What a sight.:D :D :D :D

For sheer noise, having some ****** at Cottesmore hover directly over me can't be beaten. Him and 2 mates had been coming into land, and the last one hovered backwards for a bit to be directly overhead the group of photographers near the runway end, just outside the fence. Blew umbrellas and things all over the place and couldn't hear a damn thing for about 10 minutes. Not so much a low pass as a low squat-on-top-of-you really.

My father tells a story about a Skyhawk low pass he saw once when he was in the RN. Approached his ship at below deck height and pulled up going over the ship, flashing past just above the main gun and at about eye-level with the bridge windows. Thankfully the two bombs he pickled off took the same trajectory because he left it too late and just made BIG splashes in the sea a few hundred feet away. Unfortunately one his mates had better luck a few days later.

Haddenham, Cambs North of Oakington and East of Wyton.

There used to a brickworks North of the village with a tall chimney,
saw a Vampire one evening come off the fen going N-E who had to bank right to miss the chimney.
Later had the chance to see the same sort of thing from the other side, arrived back with outboard fuel in the NF10 so my driver (Pat S.) decided to burn it off running down the Solent jumping yatch masts, called it 10 mins local, all the way to Poole and back to Thorney.

I was at 'First Flight Memorial' in Kitty Hawk North Carolina, on a vacation one year. The monument is a stone obelisk on top of a fairly high sand dune.

My (now-ex) wife and I were just starting to leave the monument when I happened to notice two F-14s coming in low. They circled the monument and hill, about 50' above us, lit the burners, and roared back up north.

Still don't know why I looked up-there was absolutely no sound on the way in, but quite a roar as the tomcats departed.

It turns out that the monument is a common training run landmark for Navy planes out of Oceana NAS (near Norfolk Naval Base) so this wasn't a special treat just for me :D

Watching Lighnings depart from Valley (EGOV) in the early 70s in the most violent vertical trajectory that could be imagened, was then, and still is my most endearing thought of power most awsome!:cool:

If it is just noise your interested in how about these two experiences. Both occurred while I was a Tech Rep on the Atlas ICBM.

In one case I was walking alongside an Atlas as it rested in the coffin complex. The Air Force was exercising the control radar, which sent control signals to an antenna on the roof of the complex. They would send control signals, which in turn would cause the rocket engines to displace, as they would in powered flight. The generated signal was so strong that it overcame the grounding circuits causing two 1000 Pound Second rocket motors to ignite. I was three feet below these rockets when they went off and it was like two shotguns going off next to my ears.

In another instance I was checking out the hold down and release system which consisted of two large pneumatic rams that under pressure held the Atlas into the launcher. At a predetermined time the internal pressure would be vented and the missile would be released from the launcher.

In the test the rams which have 750 Cubic inches of displacement and are pressurized to 5500 PSI with Nitrogen gas. The launcher is inside of the coffin complex and I was about six feet from one cylinder and sixteen feet from the other cylinder. I had no hearing protection and when I pressed the release button the valves opened and the rams blew down to ambient in about 2/10th of a second. That noise was like standing next to the barrels of two 155mm cannons.


:cool:

Someone out there must have had this happen to them..

A couple of years back I was involved with testing parachuting stuff at China Lake, Ca.

Well one weekend I sense terminal boredom setting in so I take a drive out to Death Valley. Its pretty much an all day drive there and back and there is one particular stretch of road just North of a place called Truna (I think) that is particularly straight for about as far as the eye can see. So its getting dark and Im heading back and I suppose im not really as attentive as I should be.. I think I sensed rather than heard it first, when this b##tard in his F18 sneaks up from behind and practically takes my roof off then pulls up and half rolls away! I tell you I could FEEL the heat.

Initially I was p##sed off cos hed scared the s##ts out of me, then saw the funny side and grinned all the rest of the way back.

Whilst I share the sentiments behind all the memories of the Vulcan, and recall a shattering spiral climb out of Leuchars some years ago, I reckon pride of place must go to the Lightning. Not many references to it here, sadly, but I can remember the sight and SOUND of (was it ?) 74 Sqn's aerobatic team departing Farnborough for their display. Now, that was an experience ! :D

In the early 70's I was on the receiving end of a demonstration of close ground support by a squadron of USAF F4s just back fro 'Nam'. They really did mean CLOSE too!

Orac and/or Beagle
Mt.Alice
What was it and when-just professional interest of course?
Wasn`t a Kiwi perchance?;)

ORAC/Beagle - this sort of thing, was it?

(Sent to me by a chap whose email address sadly bounced so I can't even say thanks!)

http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/f4low.jpg