{"id":8148,"date":"2024-08-11T23:05:13","date_gmt":"2024-08-12T04:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/?p=8148"},"modified":"2024-08-14T17:08:44","modified_gmt":"2024-08-14T22:08:44","slug":"like-a-kid-in-a-winged-candy-store","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/?p=8148","title":{"rendered":"Like a kid in a winged candy store"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Recently, some town east of here called Fargo held a little thing they call the Airsho. I went down the day before as part of a meet & greet with the Blue Angels, the A-10 Thunderbolt demo pilots, and the F-22 Raptor demo team. It was a fantastic day!<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Let’s start off with my beloved A-10. Also known as the Warthog, it’s an absolutely lovely aircraft in a way some would call ugly. No ugliness here, as far as I’m concerned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Of course, it’s famous for its business end. The A-10 is known as “a gun with a plane built around it” for a reason.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

But boy, it’s got a nice tail end, too. What a beauty! Of course, I’m incredibly biased; this has been one of my favorite aircraft since I was a kid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

This engine. Oh boy, this engine. It’s got two, by the way. I didn’t know these guys were in the air, but while we were climbing around the C-130 I heard them on approach. There’s nothing that sounds like it. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to hear the “BRRRRRT” of the cannon, too!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

One cool thing about this<\/em> A-10 is the artwork inside the door for the access ladder. One thing about the Air Force – they love<\/em> to paint things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

I love it…a tribute to the victims of 9-11 and a commitment to freedom and liberty. Anyone who’s heard that scream and faced that wrath knows exactly<\/span> what this means, and how serious it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

“Fat Albert” is the C-130 that hauls all the Blue Angels’ ancillary equipment. One thing you can do with a plane like this is clean your own windshield! Can’t do that<\/em> in a fighter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

I would not<\/span> want to get caught in these props. They’re capable not only of turning a guy into fish food, but of generating a lot of lift, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Note the intake cover: Fat Albert Airlines. Fat Albert is one of the stars of the show, too!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Of course, we wanted to poke around the F-18. These things are such a beautiful blue! And this is one of the few times when I really love the color yellow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

SO beautiful. These are Super Hornets. The Blue Angels have flown Hornets for a long time, and a number of other aircraft before that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

History. A friend of mine got to see these guys practice regularly when he lived in Pensacola. That’d be a blast! Although, he says, it’s amazing what you can get used to…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

If you can read this while the turbines are spun up, you may have a problem in an instant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Here was my Bucket List item: the F-22 Raptor! Due to the nature of this aircraft, this was as close as I could take a photo. At some airshows where an F-22 is on display, one can get closer, but since we were actually going to get to touch<\/em> this aircraft and spend quite a bit of one-on-one time with the pilot and ground crew we had to leave our electronics at this point. It’s a good thing: any photos of me would have captured the drool!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The F-22 was the last aircraft on my “must-touch” list: the A-10, SR-71, F-14, F-15, F-16, F-18, F-35, B-1, B-52, MQ-9, RQ-4, and others came before. I can gleefully say that this thing is sharp<\/em> – the tip is actually very pointy! And those thrust-vectoring nozzles…ooooh. What about the B-2, you ask? Yeah…out of my league, at least for now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what about the actual air show? Well, that’s for tomorrow’s post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently, some town east of here called Fargo held a little thing they call the Airsho. I went down the day before as part of a meet & greet with the Blue Angels, the A-10 Thunderbolt demo pilots, and the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,19,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-events","category-military","category-vehicles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8148"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8161,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8148\/revisions\/8161"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bismarckmandanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}