This Old Bird 🎵 She Chops Air 🚁 She Gives People Such a Scare... 🎶
The yearly Air show took place at General Rodriguez airport just outside the city of Buenos Aires last weekend. I couldn't go Saturday, so I went Sunday with a group of people.
six dollars per person to get it.This is a yearly event and I'm a pilot so I tend to gravitate toward things like this. When I lived in the US of A, I went to every air show that I can get my hands on! None of them, however, or as small as this one but that's what makes it charming.
Most of the air shows that I used to go to where in big cities and featured a lot of military aircraft which is a great part of the show. Most of my air show content, now that I live in South America, is posted on my other channel which is dedicated to aviation. It's called @maniobras - you can follow me here.
I'm not a great photographer or video maker, but I do try to portray my experiences in aviation and I dabble in video editing as you will see in the video below.
The Huey!
This post had to be made on my main account because it reminds me of the good old times where I used to be up close and personal with military aircraft. This is the Bell UH-1 aka "Huey" which caught my attention after I walked the entire length of the airport to the touchdown zone of the runway.
Look at her compared to the last plane I flew.Behind me was an old DC3 which is a feature here at the airport, and probably will be for a while because they're restoring it. And on either side of me as I watch the air show, were two military helicopters. The Huey to my left and another one to my right. They both had the word Ejercito written on the fuselage, meaning they are military craft for this country.
I was bound and determined to stay right next to it until the end of the air show, which is the time they would have to move it. You can either move these with a crane, or you can hover taxi them to the takeoff zone. I didn't see a crane, so I wanted to see them started in hover taxi the son of a bitch over to the runway.
All day long, people would move over to this marvelous aircraft and sit inside her and take pictures, then they would talk to the crew about her. I took a few pictures of what she looks like but I really wanted a video of the takeoff which you have below.
▶️ Watch on 3Speak
Up Close Shots
Here's the business end of this beauty, I think she holds stinger missiles and extra fuel tanks, but I didn't talk to the pilot or crew because I'm a little bit embarrassed of my Spanish. I don't know a lot of the words related to aviation in that language because they don't come up in normal conversation.
For the crew and gear: looks like the back of my pickup!I did a lot of moving when I had my truck. You go, you load, you unload - rinse and repeat. I guess it is about the same with this flying pickup truck. She is made for efficiency in her tasks. This one has no machine gun on it, but I am sure they could get one mounted in no time.
Fuap-fuap-fuap maker...These are just moving wings and the rods and bearings to make them change angle. They are critical components to flight and they must be changed every X hours in order to be certified for duty.
The sound of this baby (especially when she is inbound) is unmistakable, as is the sound of an A10. In each case, you do know it's coming before it hits you. These motorized elevators are a work of art in their function. I have not learned how to fly them because I prefer fixed wing aircraft. With planes, you know you can land them if something goes wrong with the engine, and their is plenty of time to pick a spot and fly to it.
Here's one as she took off out of site. You can see it in the video if you haven't watched it yet. When this bird left, I was heading for the car. Then I remembered that everything that leaves makes a high speed pass over the runway after it takes off. I did not get back to the tarmac in time to film that - a sad thing. None of my friends had a good video of it either.
I hope you enjoyed this blast from the past. The rest of the airshow content will be posted on the @maniobras Hive blog. I hope to see you there.
