It was always my intention when I named my blog ‘railsroadsrunways’ nine years ago to give as even a spread of coverage as was possible to the three forms of transport.
Unfortunately, of late, for various reasons, the ‘runways’ element has been neglected.
The increases in security at military bases, the loss of shows at RAF Waddington and Scampton. The general run down of the numbers of military aircraft which, as a result of the Ukraine war, might see an upsurge in spending.
Then there has been the Covid pandemic which removed the civil airliner coverage almost overnight.
The ‘Royal International Air Tattoo’ started life 50 years ago as simply the ‘International Air Tattoo’ and during that time, most of the events have taken place at ‘RAF Fairford’ in Gloucestershire.
The use of ‘RAF’ in the name of the base is a bit of a misnomer because it is the ‘United States Air Force’ who are the resident operator.
Usually with bombers from either the B1, B2 or B52 fleets together with their air refuelling tanker support.
The ‘fashion’ for jet trainers over the years has varied from side by side seating for the trainee and instructor to them being seated in tandem.
The tandem seating arrangement is the current standard but we start with two classic British side by side trainers.
XE 688 ‘Hawker Hunter Aviation Ltd’. (HHA).
Hawker Hunter T.72
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
The original XE688, an F4 dated from 1955 was written off after an accident in 1957.
The current XE688 was built from an assortment of parts both new and re-cycled, including parts from the original XE 688 in the 1970s.
Sold to the ‘Chilean Air Force’ as J-736 who in turn sold it on to Brazilian airframer ‘Embraer’ who used it as a chase plane registered PP-XHH.
It returned to ‘HHA’ in the UK in 2018.
To those readers/viewers interested, ‘Hawker Hunter Aviation Ltd’. are an interesting company operating a variety of legacy jet aircraft. Worth a Google!
XW324 ‘Royal Air Force’, U.
BAC 84 Jet Provost T5
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
Dating from 1970, it at one time carried the civilian registration G-BWSG .
ZB 132 ‘Qatari Emiri Air Force’.
BAe Hawk Mk 167
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
One of 2, the other being ZB131.
Both from No. 10 squadron.
MM55219 ‘Italian Air Force’ 61-20.
Leonardo Velivoli (Aermacchi) T-346 Master
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
10-0059 ‘Republic of Korea Air Force’.
Korean Aerospace T-50B Golden Eagle.
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
The Golden Eagles being the ’Korean Air Force’s formation aerobatics team.
MM55064 ’Italian Air Force’ 61-131.
Aermacchi MB-339CD
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
MM54539, ‘Italian Air Force’, 0 frecci tricolori.
Aermacchi MB-339PAN
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
frecci tricolori being the ’Italian Air Force’s formation aerobatics team.
ZM337 ‘Royal Air Force’,
Embraer Phenom T1
on Dennis Basford’s railsroadsrunways.blogspot.co.uk’
