2011 Offutt AFB Open House & "Defenders of Freedom" Air Show

[smitty1960]

This is my first post on Scramble. Please advise if I break any rules. This is one of the Cold War Air Museum's (CWAM) two airworthy Mil Mi-24D HIND. This is the only Mi-24 currently performing public demonstrations in the U.S. CWAM has one other that recently was FAA certified and will join the airshow circuit soon. Their third Mi-24 is non-flightworthy and is used as a gate guard at their home base at Lancaster airport just south of Dallas, Texas.



Can I post larger size images? Is a watermark suggested? Smitty

[perrie]

WOW
Very nice, more please
Don't think you are breaking any rules with these great pics!

regards, Per

[smitty1960]

Without any big name teams this year (i.e, Blue Angels, Thunderbirds), the airshow was pretty weak. But I did manage a few nice shots of static aircraft arriving and departing. The F-15E Strike Eagle demo team and Mi-24 were the highlights of the show.

[Stratofreighter]

Mil Mi-24 Hinds aren't that unusual in Europe, but an E-4 and an RC-135 are!

[smitty1960]

Monday morning following the airshow the E-3C Sentry and E-8C JSTARS departed for their homes. The 55th Wing RC-135W Rivet Joint 62-4132 was departing home base for a "mission". This aircraft is the first -135 airframe to surpass 50,000 flyinmg hours!

[CONDOR]

Superb report ! Thanks very much for showing.

[Stephan Lodewijks]

Nice pictures, always welcome!

(The retracted landing gear makes your Hind-photos different from what I'm used to!)

Stephan

[smitty1960]

Thanks for the compliments CONDOR and Stephan. I have more shots from that show, but mostly of the same aircraft at different angles plus a few warbirds. I don't typically photograph the smaller aerobatic acts. I also have shots from previous airshows at Offutt going back to 2005, as well as the Quad City Air Show in Davenport, Iowa from both 2010 and 2011. It seems there are very few "mid-west" shots posted here, but I don't know if it's acceptable to post older "archive" photos here. I have "spotter" shots of many of Offutt's traffic (E-4B, E-6A, RC-135, WC-135, etc.). Should those be posted here, or on a different forum. Sorry for so many questions, but I'm a newbie on this site.

[CONDOR]

smitty1960, I myself should say please post m. I am very interested in any photo taken at Offutt.
I presume it 's gonna be photoheavy so maybe it's to the MOD to decide.

[smitty1960]

I'll post Offutt AFB "spotting" photos in a different thread from Offutt "airshow" photos. Is there a limit to how many photos per post or a photo size restriction?

[Macc]

That Hind is excellent! Give us more as I'm very much liking these. As long as each picture is up to the quality of these already shown then as many possible!

Chris

[smitty1960]

Here's one more for you Chris. You'll have to wait a little bit longer for more. I'm very slow at editing.