FIA18

And so today was our two yearly trip to see the planes at Farnborough. This is our third time and easily the worst. I’m not really sure why everything has changed but it has and it’s not for the better. Actually, not ‘everything’ because the flying displays were still, as always, brilliant. It was more the organisation which saw queues upon queues upon queues. I’m surprised there wasn’t queues for the queues.

I’m not going to mention the fact that Mirinda and Sophie do not seem able to organise themselves very well and finding someone on a screen dump blue dot is not easy. Still, we somehow, as if by magic, managed to find them and we all joined our first queue for the day; the one for the shuttle bus.

To be fair, the queue for the shuttle bus, though long, did dissipate rather quickly. It also proved yet again that more people can be moved more efficiently if they all catch a bus.

The only problem with this queue was the guy putting wristbands around the wrists of children. On the wristband the guy wrote the parents’ mobile phone number. This was in case of loss. It’s a very good idea except when it disrupts the queue for the bus to the extent that people start pushing forward. I wonder why they couldn’t have just handed out the wrist bands for the parents to take responsibility for their own children. This, however, was a small problem.

Obviously when we reached the airfield there was a massive, snaking queue to get in. Though huge and looking like we’d miss everything in the waiting, it went quite smoothly and we were soon through the security screening.

Queuing before reaching the entrance queue

The worst part of the day, however, was ahead of us as we realised that the queue to get into the Runway Enclosure was about the length of a standard runway. By the time we reached the end of it and joined it along with a few thousand other disgruntled people, we’d walked the equivalent of 30 trips around an Airbus 380…including the wings. It also meant we didn’t get to see any of the static displays, which was a shame.

Still, we stood then shuffled then stood then shuffled some more. Sophie and Tom didn’t seem to mind but Mirinda was not best pleased and told the person at the security desk what she thought should be communicated to her manager.

We did get a brief visit from Nicktor who was hunting down some food then ran off to join Dawn as they were ahead of us in the queue. We didn’t see them again.

The thing is, we originally chose the Runway Enclosure because the view is better and all the tricks are right in front of it. For this you pay extra, obviously, which has meant that it’s never as crowded as the rest of the show. I don’t know what they’ve done with the price but it felt like there were 100,000 people in the enclosure this year.

This isn’t a problem except for seating and when people decide to have a cigarette. The four of us sat on the grass, which is fine to a point, and were attacked by cigarette smoke three times. In fact one chap suddenly appeared and plonked himself down in front of us and lit up. A little while later his wife and daughter came over, asked him if he’d finished and then took him away with them. In other words, he doesn’t want his family to breathe his second hand smoke but is quite happy for everyone else to.

That makes it sound like the day was an unmitigated disaster and, to be honest, it felt like it was going to be until the planes started flying. And then, of course, it was brilliant.

This year, for a change, we had the Red Bull air racers having timed runs through an obstacle course of inflatable posts. This really has to be seen to be believed. It is an extraordinary, adrenaline fuelled experience just watching so I can only imagine what it feels like in the cockpit.

Of course there were also the old faithfuls like the Harrier and the F16 (though we could have done without the overly ‘ra-ra’ American commentator unsuccessfully trying to out-compete the jet for excitement) and the World War 1 dog fights. However, still my favourite are the Wing Walkers. (I offered to pay for Tom to have a go but he declined. I guess a boy who is afraid of wasps is hardly going to stand on the upper wing of a bi-plane as it swoops, climbs and dives through the sky.)

All in all, once the arrival and claiming of a square foot of ground was endured, the actual airshow was excellent and we all left having had an enjoyable bit of a day. After dropping Sophie and Tom at their car for their long trip back to Peasmarsh and Boris, we drove home, discussing things to remember for next time to make for a more enjoyable day out.

That is if we actually do go in 2020. This year was a bit of an endurance test really and not the lovely day we’ve had in the past.

The day was capped off with a fly over our terrace by the Red Arrows late on.

And here’s a short video of the Wing Walkers. My apologies for the grainy quality but it was taken with my phone from a rather great distance.

This entry was posted in Gary's Posts. Bookmark the permalink.

One Response to FIA18

  1. mum says:

    That was great watched it a couple of times pity they didn’t use coloured streames as it was hard to see the white ones when they went through the clouds, the other times you have been I am sure they were coloured. Still it was good thank you. love mum xxx

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.