Aviation Fans?

yea, I get enough of that from my dads friend, hes flies with the British RAF red arrows, he also pilots helicopters, and er.... commerial airliners :/

To top that off, I was supposed to study a degree in Aerospace engineering, but it was over subcribed so I choose its close close relative Mehanical engineering, its exactly the same the only difference being 1 module, heh, all my mates studied Aero, we had pretty much the same classes. So yea I'm interested more in the engineering aspects of Aircrafts :D

Thanks for the post!
 
Hey Tower. I liked the updates. I've downloaded the hires stuff. Still have to get the others as well. I didn't see a download link at the time, maybe I have to log in.

My dad was an aircraft mechanic and one of my nephews just retired from the British Marines as a helo pilot.

If I had a spare $100K I'd have a running spitfire replica in my backyard.
And a helo pad on my roof, with ofcourse, a helo.

//OH, and living 10 miles from a major airbase I get to see alot of the military aircraft. The jets do low flyby's sometimes over the house. When 911 happened, they were everywhere. Whizzing over the rooftops.
 
Here's a couple more shots from the local museum (not pro, reference pics only) from last year.

I've recently uploaded my pics of the spitfire replica for 3D modellers reference.
Reduced in size to 800x600...
http://s179.photobucket.com/albums/w289/TheRaptor365/Spitfire Pics/

Also, Janusz's grandfather flew seafires in the war. Have not heard from him in a while.

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F-22 Raptor

F-22 Raptor

I didn't kow anyone replied to this thread! For some reason the site isn't sending me emails... I can't figure out why.

I shot the F-22 Raptor this weekend and the March Field Air Fest 2008. This was the first demo on the west coast. What a killer plane!! Video just doesn't do it justice.

Enjoy!

http://www.vimeo.com/991805
 
I love airplanes. Especially old school military.

I did the RED BULL AIR RACE last Saturday; crazy flying fools.
 
Yeah, I'm big on planes too. Love watching docs on Discovery and History and love palying flight simulator games. I grew up next to an airport so whenever there was an airshow that would come to town, we always would get an extra show when they'd be training. Nothing like having like 6 jets roar over you. Awesome.

The Raptor kicks ass. That was awesome.

Funny, I love planes, but I'm not that big on flying.

Anyone have an estimate of how many jets are in the US airforce and Navy? In Canada The RCAF has about 100 CF-18 Hornets, that's not a lot.
 
Thanks J. I grew up near El Toro Marine Corps Air Station (Orange County, CA) and my Father was in the Air Force so I saw lots of planes/shows as a kid. El Toro's closed now though.

Yeah, the Raptor is a crazy plane. Wouldn't want to be on the sharp end of that stick!

I'm the same on looking vs. flying. I took a ride in an AT-6 Texan (WWII trainer) out of the Carlsbad airport once. The pilot did an aileron roll and a split-S and I was done. Nausea city! It was worth it though. He let me fly it a bit too.
 
Wikipedia estimates that there are 7,500 aircraft operational in the US Airforce and Navy. That's crazy.

Discovery Channel Canada just aired a show called Jetstream and it followed the training of several recruits trying to become a pilot of the CF-18, the test they had to pass, flight, hittting targets, firing the cannon. It was pretty cool.

Our government here is starting to throw some more money into the Miltary and Air Force which has badly been neglected for a long time. I guess the thought was that if we ever needed the help, you guys aren't too far away, so it has badly been underfunded for years.

During 9/11 there was a plane that was flying over US airspace that wasn't repsonding for a call to land, it was being tailed by two US F-15's and eventually went into Canadian Airspace, which we gave they go ahead to continue to follow, Chretion our Prime Minister at the time was ready to give the call to the US pilots to take it out when eventually the plane responded and signalled it would land, a communication error onboard the plane nearly resulted in it being blown out of the sky. I think that is only time US planes have been in Canadian Airspace with the intent to attack something.

Do you guys get Mayday (on Discovery) in the US? That's a great show, basically it re-enacts plane crashes that have happened and shows the investagion from the NTSB and ultimately ends up reaching a conclusion as to what went wrong. Really good show. It's crazy though that it usally ends up being an initial small errors which continues to leads to bigger and bigger ones, either from the flight crew, ground crew, design or in some cases blantant disregard for safety from the airlines. There is about 5 seasons of them, I'd recommend checking it out.
 
TowerFan said:
Thanks J. I grew up near El Toro Marine Corps Air Station (Orange County, CA) and my Father was in the Air Force so I saw lots of planes/shows as a kid. El Toro's closed now though.

Yeah, the Raptor is a crazy plane. Wouldn't want to be on the sharp end of that stick!

I'm the same on looking vs. flying. I took a ride in an AT-6 Texan (WWII trainer) out of the Carlsbad airport once. The pilot did an aileron roll and a split-S and I was done. Nausea city! It was worth it though. He let me fly it a bit too.
Click to expand...

The last air show I went to was at El Toro. We were walking back from a Confederate Air Force display and watched this one unfold...

http://www.alexisparkinn.com/photogallery/Videos/2006-8-22_F_86_El_ToroCrash.wmv

Pretty surreal. The description on the website is wrong. The pilot was executing a loop and didn't have enough on it and hit the deck. He was hundreds of feet off and it was pretty dramatic - you could feel the heat from the explosion from where we were standing.

Lucky for us that was the first year they made it mandatory that pilots fly parallel to the crowds during their demonstrations. That plane ended up about 3/4 of a mile from where the crowd was watching, so it would've taken a vast number of people out had it been perpindicular to our vantage point.

e
 
The last air show I went to was at El Toro. We were walking back from a Confederate Air Force display and watched this one unfold...

http://www.alexisparkinn.com/photoga..._ToroCrash.wmv

Pretty surreal. The description on the website is wrong. The pilot was executing a loop and didn't have enough on it and hit the deck. He was hundreds of feet off and it was pretty dramatic - you could feel the heat from the explosion from where we were standing.

Lucky for us that was the first year they made it mandatory that pilots fly parallel to the crowds during their demonstrations. That plane ended up about 3/4 of a mile from where the crowd was watching, so it would've taken a vast number of people out had it been perpindicular to our vantage point.
Click to expand...

Thats nuts. Must of been pretty crazy to see that go down.

Did the pilot survive?
 
JConnors said:
Thats nuts. Must of been pretty crazy to see that go down.

Did the pilot survive?
Click to expand...

The news guy said "... pilot was confirmed dead... "

That's horrible when stuff like that happens. There's a video floating around on the web where a Thunderbird did the same thing. Back in '04 or '05 I think. The pilot didn't account for the altitude of the field and bellied in from a loop. Fortunately he ejected just at the last moment and survived.

Hope ya'll like the Raptor video. Not my best work but came out OK. I'll be posting some more in the next week or so. Probably the C-17 demo and a B-25 demo.
 
That's the first footage I've seen of the F-22 Raptor.

It looks as if that thing can turn on a dime. And the part where the pilot walks along at 45 degrees was incredible. I've seen the Harrier do it but that's different. And I've heard of pilots getting too close to the ground in a loop and hover like that for a few moments, not the same thing.

Also saw a P40 in there. Cool. (I watched 'The Flying Tigers' a few nights ago. Been awhile since I've seen a steering wheel in a plane, hehe).

--

I've noticed some banding in the sky. Is that from codec compression?

Oh, and if you spot a spitfire, shoot it in the highest res possible. I don't think (?) there's any left in Canada. :)
 
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JConnors said:
Thats nuts. Must of been pretty crazy to see that go down.

Did the pilot survive?
Click to expand...

Yeah, unfortunately he didn't make it out of that one. There was a real strange quiet that came over that event - you know, thousands of people suddenly going almost silent at once.

We hung around for a bit - they didn't confirm what we all kinda knew until an hour after the crash. The show went on, but we decided to leave for the day. Though we were head-over-heels into climbing around on the Hummers and aircraft that they had on display there, it didn't feel right just kind of ignoring the fact that one of the demonstrators had lost his life in front of us.

At least the guy went doing the thing he likely loved more than anything else.

Years later, during Fleet Week in San Francisco, we got to watch the Blue Angels work below sky-scraper level in the bay. That is kick-ass. That particular year, they also flew the new (as in only recently revealed) B2 over the City. It approached from somewhere over the East Bay and you absolutely could not hear it coming.

gpw-20061112i-UnitedStatesNavy-051009-N-7559C-001.jpg

B2 is quiet - these guys... not so much. This picture is from the year the Angels got in a little trouble for flying between SF's skyscrapers during the few days of practice flights. They really push the limits in these shows - here, right to the edge of the sound barrier. All the people on those boats are thinking the same thing... HOLY CRAP!!!

That thing is a trip, because by the time you hear it, it is past you. Also, from underneath, it simply looks like someone cut the shape of it out of the otherwise blue sky. Like black construction paper - no signs of extrusion or relief. No shadows from one part of the structure onto another.

It was so low that we could make out some paint details, which are the darkest gray against black. I'm not a terribly hawkish person in my old age (and hopefully, wisdom), but that thing is poo pooing AWESOME.

e
 
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