Centenary of Flight Airshow, IWM Duxford, Cambridgeshire - 7th-8th September

We're used to the IWM Duxford's September shows being rather lacklustre in comparison with the ret of their season. However, this event has to be one of the best shows ever held over the Cambridgeshire airfield. In fact, this is probably the best Air Display to mark the centenary of flight in the UK. With a representative of every major step in the development of aviation, except maybe missing out helicopters, all crammed into two hours. This was done by presenting multiple aircraft in a short space representing sports flying, airliners and of course military development. Despite the best efforts of the weather, a full display was presented on both days and full credit to the pilots for making this possible, particularly the Red Arrows who managed to display through a thunderstorm!

Another factor that clearly affected the flying were the new regulations at Duxford following an unfortunate year of accidents at the airfield. There's no doubt that local residents had fears that aircraft were simply too low over the M11 and local settlements. Despite the ill-informed comments of Germaine Greer in her Daily Telegraph column, WE the airshow going public, operators, organisers and other interested parties must respect that this fear is REAL and everything possible to keep displays safe without taking the excitement out of the airshows. We cannot afford a Ramstein scenario.

There's no doubt on the major highlight of the event which was a quite incredible display by a South African Airways Boeing 747-400. The display kept the mighty jumbo well within the boundary of the airfield and is quite simply the display of the year. Also gaining applause was the Duxford "100" formation which opened Saturday's show and it was good to see The Fighter Collection's Hawker Hurricane IV make it's show debut.

Well done Duxford and we look forward to many, many more events like this in the future!

 copyright Flightline UK 2003