Today is a real scorcher - possibly the hottest day of the year! The perfect day to travel out into the country on a motorcycle - if only I still had one. Thanks to thieving scum I am having instead to travel to an air display by car for the first time in many years. This is sub-optimal, but at least the car's built in SatNav helps me find a small airfield in the middle of nowhere. I have never been to Little Gransden (not to be confused with the nearby WW2 bomber airfield Gransden Lodge) before but have read very good reports of it's annual charity airshow. I decided it was time to pay a visit.
It's billed as a 'family' event (including a car show) without any particular theme so there is a wide range of different aircraft flying - both military and civil. This is a Spartan Executive from 1938 - a very modern looking and advanced machine for it's time. It's so 1930's it actually looks like an art -deco aircraft!
Another Spartan. They both flew together in formation at the show - a
very rare sight in the UK, or even in the USA where they were built.
This Boeing Stearman is actually not as old as the Spartans!
Continuing the training aircraft theme here is the aircraft most
pilots in theUSA moved onto after the Stearman - the Harvard.
In the background can the seen a British post war training
aircraft - the Canadian designed de Havilland Chipmunk.
If you were lucky enough not to get 'washed out' in pilot training during the war
you might be lucky enough to graduate to a 'hot ship' like the P-51 Mustang.
Once a very familiar sight in these Cambridgeshire skies.
Later in Russia they were using this trainer based on the famous Yak WW2 fighter aircraft.
Training aircraft have a tendency to come to grief - this one seems to be no exception.
Something a bit more modern - a Pitts Special aerobatic aircraft.
Small, but a very hot performer with an exceptional power-to-weight ratio
I didn't bother trying to take any pictures of aircraft actually flying - it's a complete waste of time on a phone or tiny digicam as they just look like black dots in a big sky unless you have a proper telephoto or zoom lens.
No Spitfires to be found (on the ground) today, but the star of the show was probably this rare Mk 1 Hurricane - a rarer breed than the Spitfire these days although the opposite was the case in 1940.
The weather was glorious with not a cloud in sight and scorching temperatures. The ticket price was much lower that the big air displays at better known airfields and although this was a smaller show with less of the 'heavy metal' star acts of the UK airshow scene like the Red Arrows or the RAF's Battle of Britain Memorial Flight there were still plenty of hot performers - including ones that didn't land like the Sea Fury and Spitfire so I didn't take pictures of them. It really was great value for money compared to the larger more well known airshows. One interesting 'act' was a performance by a 'Little & Large' duo - a full size aerobatic aircraft with a highly skilled pilot, and a much smaller radio controlled model of the same aircraft 'flown' from the ground - flying in formation with each other while performing all sorts of synchronised aerobatic manoeuvres - this was really amazing to see and must take incredible skill from both pilots considering the huge difference is size and power-to-weight ratio between the two aircraft. There was also some amazing aerobatic flying from display teams and solo aircraft - some of them performing manoeuvres that just don't seem possible as they seem to cease 'flying' and go totally out of control for a few moments!
One thing that really struck me about Little Gransden was the much more relaxed and informal atmosphere compared to the bigger events at places like Duxford - much more like I assume airshows used to be like many years ago. It's much easier to get closer to the aircraft on the ground and see what's going on. Yet in spite of all this it struck me as being really well organised and safe. I will definitely be back.
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