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First appearence og MIG-29 at Farnborough '88
Came past this article: https://news.google.com/newspapers?n...96,74675&hl=fi
Contrary to todays highway of information, in '88 one had to be lucky to have a buddy who had a worn VHS copy of foreign airshows and I was such fortunate around the '88 Farnborough show and enjoyed especially the presense of the MIG-29 wich had an amazing take-off where it just barely had lift when the gear was retracted :-o Common stuff on Youtube today but amazingly to experience in '88! As the article describes I remember that the arriving MIG's was intercepted and folloved by a couple of RAF Tornado's, but I recall there was some twist with that escort without specific remembering what it was :-( Does anybody remember the tell-tales from then? |
At the time the rumour was that the Tornados had to request the Migs descend to a lower cruising level so that they could accompany/escort them: IIRC something like a FL530 cruise was mentioned. Like I said, though, only a rumour. :O:O:O
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I was tower controller at Farnborough when the Mig 29s arrived. One of the duties of the accompanying Tornados was to relay ATC instructions to the Migs. We all assumed this meant in Russian, but in actual fact the relay was in English so what was the point?
I was briefed that on arrival, one of the Migs would be doing a short impromptu display. The only unusual point of this was when coming in to land, he streamed his brake 'chute when he was still about 20ft agl! |
GLASNOST
I flew the VC10K carrying the international press for this event, with Ray F Knowles (RIP) as co-pilot. I was ordered to keep the whole thing confidential and not even to tell the squadron boss - so the only people who were 'in on it' were the crew, my flight commander and 'Melons', the rather delightful station POC with MoD PR. I did rather too good a job as the station commander only found out the day beforehand out that the Director of PR was intending to come! Fortunately he changed his mind as he had something of a reputation... And if I'd told the boss, he'd have pinched the trip anyway!
We RV'd with the F3s over the North Sea and led them off to the inbound MiG 29s. The F3s wanted to do rather more than the original brief, but the intercept went fine and we headed off towards the UK with the TV crews and aviation journos taking turns on the flight deck to get their photos for the evening news and publications various, despite one F3 which didn't follow the brief and kept getting in our way. The weather was such that the planned descent over land wasn't possible as a complete formation, so we had to let the F3 and MiG 29 formation do their own thing, whilst we followed at a discrete distance amused by the chaos caused by the F3 leader plunging down with the formation through the Daventry sector amongst the airline traffic. We caught up with them as they ran in towards Farnborough, then broke off to fly back to Brize. Shortly after we left, an RAE Canberra flew over as though on a practice diversion; in fact it was taking IR photos to assess the fuel on board the Mig 29s. Throughout the week the spooks recorded the MiG fuel uplift, trying to get an overall assessment of the MiG 29 fuel burn. But the good old Sovs frustrated that by doing their final refuelling from their accompanying Antonov. Nice one Boris! |
Jogged my memory there Beags; I don't recall a Canberra doing a PD just after they landed but I do remember a Puma helicopter doing one soon after. I thought at the time it must have had some clandestine reason because we didn't normally accept PDs during the 2 weeks of Farnborough Airshow but in this case I was told it was 'an exception'.
Edit to add: I've remembered the Canberra now. Whereas the Puma did a PAR and go around at DH (150 ft for a heli in those days which he maintained for most of the runway before climbing away) the Canberra didn't make an approach, just a single pass at circuit height along the line of the runway. |
I happened to be standbuilding on the day and was taking a break at the Greasy Spoon when the weather seemed to turn black over towards the east, and an aircraft with huge headlights was spotted on the approach.
I had a strange feeling... Rushed into the hall to grab my camera and out the airfield side down to the apron, where the aircraft were taxying in. I too wondered what the Canberra was doing, seemed somehow out of place, but all would be explained later. I simply joined the throng and took what shots I could. The excitement of the occasion increased a few days later with the arrival of the An-22 ostensibly with a replacement engine for the one that went kaputt on the 124. John Blake drew me a doodle of the An-22's sideways touchdown for my visitor's book, which I managed to 'retain' but can't put my finger on right now. I bumped into the three Russian crewmembers on several occasions later, culminating in a very 'wet' reception in the 'Control Tower' at MAKS '95. Happy days! May I invite you to view the hastily reworked photos on my humble website here: [edit]: I am in the throes of reducing if not completely deleting my website in favour of flickr. I shall also make better copies once I find the originals! I shall add descriptions and names by and by. brgds and Happy Holidays, Alan |
Alan, is that Anatoly Kvochur, left on pic 12? Must have been the following year he demonstrated the MiG's ejection system at Paris after a bird ingestion!
I nipped down to see the AN-22, stopped off at a friend's place in Frimley on the way back - we heard it take off! |
It is indeed, Tredders! I remember there was a bit of a barney going on, probably about where to go or what to do next, and he was a bit pi**ed. I don't know who the chap is next to Duncan Simpson, but he obviously had his hands full.
The other two, if we take a look at photo 10/12 (or SBAC 1988_7) are, on the left, navigator Yuri Ermakov, and on the right, MiG test pilot Roman Taskaev. Yuri was one of that select band of special navigator/escorts tasked with accompanying military flights out of the country, or foreign military flights into Russia, very often with the pickup in Copenhagen. I believe it was Anatoli in the single seater, Roman and Yuri in the -UB. Anatoli stepped out at Le Bourget the following year, and I believe yet again over the Crimea, after which he switched to the Sukhoi 27, whether by design or just part of the job at Lii I dont know. One of the two pilots who had the nasty at Fairford in '93 was his wingman when he was in the air force based at Damgarten. Roman is well-known for his (FAI) record climb in a MiG-29 to 27,460 meters (90,092 feet) at Aerodrome Akhtubinsk in 1995. There was also something involving the MiG-AT... I must apologise for the quality of the photos, but they are ages old scans at 300 dpi, before I knew what that meant, and also carried an incorrect email address. I also didn't want to hijack the thread with a dozen photos! best wishes, Alan p.s. I owned the helmet 'Toli was wearing at Le Bourget, but it found a new and more suitable home just last year. |
I also didn't want to hijack the thread with a dozen photos! |
atb 1943.
On top of all that, Anatoli lost his wife not so long after. |
Believe you're right Haraka, seem to recall hearing about it at MAKS in '95. Was visiting friends in Zhukovsky one evening after the show and his apartment just across the way was pointed out, together with something about a car accident.
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@Flybiker
I'll have to learn how to all over again; tomorrow methinks, somewhat too much водка |
'an RAE Canberra'
I don't think so! |
FL575
Perhapos you were flying it from RRE? |
@FL575 Not sure where 'RAE' has been mentioned, but the lovely long-nosed RRE Canberra WH953 did appear on 6 September according to 'Farnborough Spotter' referring to it as a 'low level photo shoot'. Time of day is seldom mentioned so I wonder what that was about.
Any idea John? btw, the 5 Sqn pilot in the photos is Dave Bennett |
At Farnborough ’88 I went out of my way to make personal contact with the MiG pilots. CTP Valery Menitsky, Anatoy Kvotchur and Roman Taskaev However this was not easy because the Berlin Wall was not consigned to history until 13 months later. Consequently minders were very much in evidence whenever one met the pilots and since any conversation required an interpreter, the whole exercise lacked the easy informality that normally exists between pilots at airshows.
It will be difficult for youngsters today to appreciate the atmosphere of suspicion and fear that existed between the east and west during the cold war. Therefore, make no mistake, both the Russians and the Brits were very much feeling their way during personal contacts in 1988. Right from the beginning of my contacts with the MiG team, I had reasoned that they had no more control over their political circumstances than we as pilots had over ours. Suffice it to say that I invited the MiG pilots to the traditional dinner for the Red Arrows in the BAe chalet on the Sunday evening after the show. Things progressed further at Paris the following year such that I felt able to write to their chief designer, Michael Waldenberg, to ask if I could fly the aircraft at the next Farnborough. This resulted in a telex (those were the days) in which he agreed to talk about it at the show. PS Sorry dunno anything about the Canberra |
Originally Posted by FL575
(Post 9206345)
'an RAE Canberra'
I don't think so! |
If it wasn't 'RAE', then it was a raspberry ripple Cranberry operated by someone else...
The 5 sqn 'pilot' in the photo with the MiG mates is a navigator not a pilot! He is Dave Bennett, a hugely competent fightergator QWI on the F-4 with whom I was privileged to fly on 56(F) squadron before his move to add quality to the F3 world. |
The 5 sqn 'pilot' in the photo with the MiG mates is a navigator not a pilot! He is Dave Bennett, a hugely competent fightergator QWI on the F-4 with whom I was privileged to fly on 56(F) squadron before his move to add quality to the F-3 world. |
Head? Head! Who said 'head'? I'll take some of that!
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John Farley wrote:
Right from the beginning of my contacts with the MiG team, I had reasoned that they had no more control over their political circumstances than we as pilots had over ours. Come the day, it was great fun - apart, that is, for the poor sweating KGB chap who'd been left at the Gateway by his colleagues and had to huff and puff his way back to the Il-62 in his standard issue raincoat worried that someone might think he was a defector! On the jet I was in, the senior hostie was a bit Rosa Klebb until we thanked her for inviting us to have a coffee. Whereupon she instantly transformed into a smiling prep school matron and ushered her lovely girls forward to serve us with some superb coffee and delicious Russian chocolate. Once the aircrew had worked out that we were just ordinary RAF aircrew and not some MoD spooks, we had a very congenial time in their nice warm aircraft. There was also a rather attractive Russian-speaking female USAF navigator, who was sent to help them with any US airspace queries. On hearing slightly raised voices from the flight deck after she came on board, I asked "Surely you have female aircrew too?". To which they replied "Da - but not like her!". When the in-flight catering turned up from Heathrow, it came with 2 large poly bags containing greenery. "Bugger me", I thought, "they really do eat cabbage sandwiches!". But there'd been a c.ock-up - they'd been sent 500g of parsley for garnish, rather than the 50g they'd requested. Half a kilogram of parsley takes up a lot of space! |
On the friday of display week, I was asked to attend the airshow Ops tent (in my role as the person who wrote the draft of the daily flying display programme). There I met Anatoly who told me in slow English 'the Mig 29 will not be displaying tomorrow'. I gathered that after 6 days, he wanted a break and went off to London for a p-up!! He was back for the sunday display though.
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Expansion of subject.
Reading on the subject, it seems that the '88 show at Farnborough was the in air debut of Dassault Rafale :-/
Rafale-A had been showed in Paris 1987, but apparently this was only on static display. Anybody with the knowledge of this? Additionally 1988 isn't to forget for the Rammstein disaster just weeks before Farnborough :-o |
The Rafale did fly at the 1987 Paris show:
www.airliners.net/photo/Dassault-Rafale-A/0516447/L/ |
Well found Vzlet!
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Well, in this case, I did have inside information!
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Always nice to hear the words directly of the horses own mouth (as the old Danish saying goes) ;-)
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As I remember, my childhood copy of T. Shia's 'Airshows 86' had images of both EAP and Rafale A flying at Farnborough that year.
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My shot of the Rafale at the '88 show. Somewhere I have the negs with static shots of the Mig-29 but as they are b&w cannot add anything to those already posted.
http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...pseaqxs8ah.jpg PS - maybe I can - just remembered I had uploaded some shots to Photobucket yonks ago:- http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...t/F002_800.jpg |
As I remember, my childhood copy of T. Shia's 'Airshows 86' had images of both EAP and Rafale A flying at Farnborough that year. http://i67.tinypic.com/rcoo61.jpg (Cracking the picture-barrier by the tinypic.com -tip!) |
Originally Posted by Lyneham Lad;9218247
PS - maybe I can - just remembered I had uploaded some shots to Photobucket yonks ago:- [IMG http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f84/Lyneham_Lad/Aircraft/F002_800.jpg[/IMG]
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Originally Posted by chevvron
(Post 9218518)
Hmm the AN 124 in the background. It was parked on the main runway prior to the flying display and had to be towed to the 18 threshold after this. The tow involved a turn of about 160 deg onto what is now taxiway 'C' and one day, they managed to break the towbar. As AN124 towbars weren't too prolific in the UK in those days, this meant the runway was blocked and no flying display. After a lot of phone calls, the crew were traced (at lunch and downing vino) and were prevailed upon to go out and start up a couple of engines so as to taxy it clear!!
http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...t/F030_800.jpg http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...t/F031_800.jpg http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f8...t/F010_800.jpg |
As the stories comes in I wonder wich other news on the '88 Farnborough might have been surpressed by the presence of the Soviet delegation :-/
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Originally Posted by atb1943
(Post 9205313)
The excitement of the occasion increased a few days later with the arrival of the An-22 ostensibly with a replacement engine for the one that went kaputt on the 124. John Blake drew me a doodle of the An-22's sideways touchdown for my visitor's book, which I managed to 'retain' but can't put my finger on right now.
The AN 22 arrived on the wednesday I think with a replacement engine. Its sideways landing was, we concluded, due to the fact he lined up on the dayglo display line markers thinking they were the runway and only realised his mistake as he passed over the tower where I was outside on the balcony. The tyre marks indicated he touched town just off the left side of the runway on a taxiway turnoff and went over a bit of grass before regaining the paved surface. An MOD policeman stood next to me filming with a video camera and gave ATC a couple of copies which were still in our archive when I retired. |
An 'interesting arrival' by the An 22, it was indeed:
(See from 1:30 - 1:40) :hmm: |
Very many thanks BEagle! I had forgotten that it was that - shall we say - unusual! Glad the engine was strapped in tightly, otherwise it might have ended up in the Flight chalet! IIRC they had a few problems with overflight permission, mainly from the Germans, which may have been the reason for the late arrival.
Question, completely off-thread: did the Shackleton provide the same type of reverberation/sound? I really can't remember when I last heard one. Anyone? |
I was in the Queens Hotel having a cup of tea when the sound of what sharply reminded me of a formation of Lancasters came louder and louder, heralding the An-22's approach . IIRC it was around for a few minutes before that highly individual final arrival.
A Shackleton normally produced a much quieter growl. |
Last Shack to display at Farnborough was an AEW2 c/s 'Gambia 08'; don't remember what year but it was between '88 and 2002 'cos we were still in the old tower.(may have been 2002)
An AWACS preceded the Shack to show what was replacing it; I told Gambia 08 to tuck himself in as close as possible behind the AWACS. |
My up close visit with the Mig-29
I know I am posting into an older post, and that maybe no one will see it, but when I saw this, I had to subscribe and write the below from the perspective of my poor memory.
Hi, just a newbie here. My story about the visit of the Mig-29 at Farnborough in 1988 is a bit sketchy in my memory but I was there. Myself and our shooting team (for RAF Stafford) were at Bisley in competition. Our boss, who we had nicknamed 'Tackleberry' after the gun nut in the Police Academy film, asked if anyone wanted to go to see the airshow at Farnborough. Being an avid fan of airshows I and a few others jumped in the Land Rover and off we went. What we didn't realise was that he got us special access to the place. I recall we went through a crash gate and parked up next to a big old looking jet that I had only seen in pictures, the aforesaid Mig-29. Needless to say, I was a little gobsmacked. Forget how long we were there, but we spoke to a few people nearby, I think the pilot was there too. I am assuming, as my memory is a little faulty, that this was the display aircraft. I ran my hands over different parts of the fuselage, and was quite surprised at how 'robustly' it was built. I thought the last time I saw rivets like that they were on the Ark Royal. It felt somewhat like the skin of the Buccaneer, very tough. The memory, despite it being so long ago, feels as surreal as the experience was. |
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