Pie!

Skyler and I found some cherries along the canal road late last week.  This became a mission for Mommy to go and pick them so that she could make a pie.  Skyler helped her make it by tasting everything!

Skyler using the cherry pit removing tool while Mommy cuts the cherries up.  It was quite possibly the best cherry pie I've ever had!

WOW!!!!

Cross your fingers!

Let's hope Blogger cooperates and uploads more pictures!

Aannndd....  They can fly from right to left!

A heart minus #6 solo.

Bomburst.

# 5 up the middle.

The meet at the bottom after the bomburst.

Finished!  Canopies up.

F-35 and F-22.

F-35C from the Marines!  Complete with folding wingtips.

Special foil cover for the avionics in the cockpit.

Impressive.

The F-22 is butt ugly! 

15 years ago, I worked on the machining of the horizontal stabilizers doing 5 the axis CNC programming at ATK, now Northrup Grumman.

Minuteman II second stage.

Minuteman II transporter.

2nd stage nozzle.

First stage.  Look how primitive 50+ year old composite technology looks!

3rd stage at the front of the trailer.

Where the transporter is bolted to the ground above the missile silo during loading and unloading.

3rd stage.

sdfsdf

Howitzer!  He called it a tank.  :)

Grumman TBM Avenger from WWII.

The Air Force has great taste in vehicles, Can Am Maverick turbo!

More airshow.

The Thunderbirds were supposed to fly at 3:00.  We were thrilled to hear that they were starting the show 10 minutes early!  Sadly, that early start ended in an hour delay after #6 had a hot start engine failure.  They finally got it running, but after taxiing to the South end of the runway, the EGT's (exhaust gas temps) were not coming back down.  They went for the backup F-16 but it had a fuel leak!  The decision to fly with 5 planes was made and we were underway at 4:00.

Fire trucks racing to the South end of the runway!  Not show, the brand new fire station built since we were last on base complete with 16 bays!

Liftoff!

Diamond formation.

View from a 7 year old.

Coming from the Southwest!

Hard to see, but #3 was an F-16D (two place) and he was flying with a drop tank!

It was an absolutely perfect day to have an airshow, temp was in the low 80's.

Up.

Over.

#5 solo upside down.

Perfect blue sky.

Classic diamond formation.

The pile of shit site also know as Blogger, won't let me upload any more photos today.   Sigh...  Let's try for part 3 tomorrow.

Airshow 2018.

We've been looking forward to the airshow for nearly 4 years now.  2 years ago, we couldn't even get onto the base due to the horrific traffic.  This year would have been a repeat had we gone in the morning. Instead, we headed up in the afternoon and got right in, parked, and walked the 2.5 miles in no problem!  A little while later, it was time for the Thunderbirds!!

The Air Force spares no expense on weed control equipment!

Detroit Diesel power units removed from the heat plant.  Note the pump manufacturer, Allis Chalmers!

Vintage Detroit Diesel logo.

Why it sucks to park on base now, the new fighter plane shelters housing 72 F-35A's!

Headed to the C-5M!  M models get new avionics and new engines.

The seating sucks on a C-5!

Headed down the nose ramp.

On to the next plane!

F-35!

F-35 pilot.  Altair found out he lives in West Point. He also gave Skyler an F-35 sticker.

P-38 Lightning next to the F-35 Lightning 2.

F-15E's from Mountain Home AFB in Idaho.

Posing in front of the AH-64 Apache wearing his Military aircraft shirt.  Hard to believe that 8 Apaches fit inside the C-5!

There they are! Show center, we had a great vantage point.

57 pounds on my shoulders!

Part 2 tomorrow...