Jets Magazine No.28 To The Skies Back Issue

Happy New Year (albeit belated!) to all our readers. I hope you had a pleasant Christmas and are now settled into what will be an enjoyable 2014. Christmas in the Bridgewater household was a quiet one this year and by Boxing Day I was already looking for ways to escape the constant repeats on the TV. It was at this point that I broke open the box of old videos and DVDs and watched some home movies I’d taken at airshows nearly 20 years ago. Reminiscing It was great to look back at aircraft we no longer see in British skies; such as Buccaneers, Tornado F.3s and Jaguars. But it was saddening at the same time to realise how many of the events are no longer part of the airshow calendar. It is easy to become melancholy and believe the claims made by some selfproclaimed
pundits that the British airshow industry is in decline, but the truth is quite different. We may have fewer events than we did back in the 1970s and 80s, but their type and quality is very different. As I watched video footage from a small ‘Barnstormers’ events at Cranfield it struck me that this was typical of many of the events today. Of course we have big events such as RIAT, Waddington and Cosford but for many of us an equal amount of pleasure can be gleaned from smaller events such as
Abingdon, Little Gransden and Sywell. This year is a Farnborough year, so hopes are high for a good turnout of modern military machinery at the Hampshire airfield and at the previous weekend’s RIAT at Fairford. Early indications show we could be in for some real treats; let’s keep our fingers crossed. Memories Unfortunately I had more reason to reminisce in the New Year, when “we” lost one of aviation’s biggest supporters.
Regular readers will perhaps be aware that I have been involved with the Air Atlantique/ Classic Flight organisation since my late teens, both as a volunteer and an employee.