Warbirds Over Kent

It is the Headcorn Air Show this weekend and the highlight is a flypast from the Battle of Britain flight on their way to the show at Eastbourne. I took this with a handheld Nikon using a 200 telephoto.

Red Fighter

Mitchell Medium Bomber

Catalina Seaplane

Army Observation Plane

Trainer

Chocs away, Biggles.

Another chance to see.

And on the way home, the Red Arrows overflew the car on their way back from Eastbourne. Great finish to a great day out.

VBCW: Shuttleworth Collection, On Silver Wings

The Hawker Hart was the RAF's front line light bomber in the early 1930s. Powered by a Rolls Royce Kestrel it was embarrassingly faster than the RAF's Bristol Bulldog fighters.

Cold War Warriors

D-Day Flight

I took this photo a few weeks ago at the Headcorn show.

The D-Day Flight: a Mitchell, a Dakota, a Mustang and a Spitfire.

The Red Arrows Over Kent

As a former resident of Newquay I have seen most of the NATO air display teams at the St Mawgan air base and while they are all very good, especially the Yanks and the Portugese, nothing matches the Red Arrows for precision flying.

The best of the best.

Enjoy.

Wings of War: Dunfold Wheels & Wings Show

A vic of SE.5as return after a dogfight, the leader trailing smoke from a damaged engine. The SE.5a was strong, fast and well armed. One of the best interceptors of the war, it was operational in Spring, 1917.

Fokker Dr I Triplanes landing. Slow and obsolete when introduced this plane still built up a fearsome reputation in Autumn 1917.

Another SE5a.

Junkers CLI all metal monoplanes. They were mainly used by the Freikorps after the war for ground attack.

Sopwith Triplane, which started the triplane craze in 1917. It wasn't a bad plane despite being a triplane.

Junkers CL.I.

Formation turn.

SE5a

Shorthorn?

Stacked up.

Triplane dawn patrol.

The Only Way Is Essex

Reenactors at a military show in Essex last weekend.

Red Arrows At Headcorn

The Red Arrows put in an appearance at the eadcorn model show.

Zooming high.

Low pass.

Things weren't quite what they seem. The two models are award winning display flyers. They cost around £10K each, if I heard correctly, and around £100 per flight in fuel and maintainence. Where does a model plane leave off and a drone begin?

Waffen SS at Headcorn

A military show wouldn't be a military show without at least a token presence from the Waffen SS. Above a Panzer Mk III.

A Hanomag with Pak (37mm?).

A scout car.

By the end of '44, the Germans were suffering something of a manpower shortage.

The Old Guard

The Communist Resistance

It is a well known fact that the communist resistance consisted mainly of pretty girls in white ankle socks.

Battleground Kent

A lot of T34/85s in Kent this summer; just as well with all the Waffen SS roaming around

War & Peace: The Waffen SS

Well, it wouldn't be a re-enactment show without the jolly chaps of the Waffen SS turning up for their annual defeat in the arena. Mind you, the closest they got to Kent in reality was in the POW ships. A nice Panther and note that the canny stormtroopers have got an AA cannon set up to chase off the dreaded Typhoons.

Some of the Waffen SS were a trifle 'portly'. I am not sure which unit is represented but it is clearly not the Hitler Youth.

Sig 33?

Okay, so its the Panzer Lehr.

The Kubelwagon.

They do seem obsessed with air defence.

OK, the least said about Villers Bocage the better. Not the British Armies finest hour.