Flying Legends 2013

The times they are a-changing. That much was evident at Flying Legends 2013, in so many ways a landmark event. In celebrating the show’s 20th anniversary, thoughts turned inevitably to highlights past, yet there was also more than a nod to the future — a future without displays by ‘the boss’.

Flying Legends 2013

Yes, Stephen Grey decided to retire from public display flying, and gave his last performances over the Legends weekend. The man who founded both The Fighter Collection and Flying Legends itself is now in his 75th year, ‘time’, he wrote in his programme introduction, to ‘celebrate an equal number of take-offs as landings’. Still Stephen will fly for fun, and head up TFC. But as he touched down on Sunday, at the controls of the F8F-2P Bearcat — the longest-serving member of TFC’s fleet — there was truly the sense of an era ending. For so long at Duxford one thought of the Hannas and the Greys, the father-and-son pairings that helmed the Old Flying Machine Company and TFC, and bestrode the warbird scene. Now, alas, neither Hanna is with us, and Grey père has hung up his display helmet.

Flying Legends 2013

No-one quite flies a piston-engined warbird like Stephen Grey, and in the Bearcat his manner of piloting, full of big, zooming, high-energy manoeuvres and devilishly fast, low passes, has enjoyed perhaps its finest expression. Immaculately executed, his last ever display was as good a demonstration of his style as one could imagine. Set to Pink Floyd’s ‘Shine On You Crazy Diamond’, it was undeniably stirring, too. Stephen’s first warbird display was in his newly-acquired P-51D Mustang, the one that became Candyman/Moose, at Bex in 1980. On the first day of that Swiss show he took the rear seat to learn first-hand from ‘the master’, Ray Hanna, up front. On the next, he flew solo. More than 30 years on, ‘the boss’ showed that he remains at the top of the game.

Flying Legends 2013

Traditionally, of course, Stephen has taken the ‘joker’ slot at Flying Legends, filling in while the finale ‘balbo’ forms up. In 2013 the baton was handed on to his son Nick, himself one of the most talented warbird exponents of long standing. And there were other indications of a new, even younger generation coming through. Richard Grace was taking part in his second Legends show, ‘Stevo’ Hinton his first. The future would seem to be in good hands.

For his ‘joker’ debut Nick Grey broke with tradition and chose TFC’s Gladiator II, an aircraft that assumed a starring role. Earlier, under the command of Pete Kynsey and accompanied by Keith Dennison in the Shuttleworth Collection’s Gladiator I, it had taken part in the first multi-aircraft formation of the Gloster fighter type witnessed since World War Two. What a sight it was, and an even better sound as first ‘PK’ and then Grey fils got the Bristol Mercury-powered machine going with great gusto. If only anyone present could have recalled the Empire Air Days and RAF Displays of the mid-late 1930s, their memories of the Gladiator’s heyday would surely have been triggered, such were the elegant aerobatics.

As the Gladiators turned downwind, so into the air growled more products of that era. Accompanying the two Hawker Nimrods, from TFC and the Historic Aircraft Collection, and Howell Davis’ Demon (alas, the Shuttleworth Hind was unserviceable) was a real star of Flying Legends 2013, Hurricane IIa P3351/F-AZXR. Not since 1942 had this aircraft flown in Britain, as then it was transferred to the Soviet Union. While P3351 is now registered to Jan Friso Roozen, a Dutchman who bases it at Cannes, it is no stranger to being flown by Keith Skilling — the Hurricane was a regular mount for the genial Kiwi during its years with the Alpine Fighter Collection. His solo sequence was notably spirited.

Star billing pre-show had gone to the first display by the Bremont Horsemen Flight Team — Steve Hinton, Dan Friedkin and Ed Shipley — in a trio of Spitfires. Elliptical wingtips were fitted to TFC’s LFVb EP120 so its appearance could better match the beautiful Spitfire Ia duo that joined it, AR213 (still in the No 71 Squadron markings as ‘P7308’ applied for Duxford’s Eagle Squadron display in May) and X4650, both from the Friedkin stable. Did their efforts live up to the publicity? Your author was more of a Horsemen fan when they performed a two-ship Mustang display, the closeness of their formation work as such looking all the more impressive, but this was still a most pleasing performance, a mix of sweeping passes and smooth aerobatic figures.

The ‘Spit’ sequence that followed was rather different from the norm, but excellent nonetheless. After some paired aeros from Cliff Spink and John Romain, each of the Buchóns, courtesy Spitfire Ltd and the Aircraft Restoration Company, found two Spitfires on its tail — the former the two-seat Grace machine, flown here by Dave Puleston for his Legends debut in a big warbird, and TFC’s FRXIVe, the latter the Old Flying Machine Company’s LFIX and Spitfire Ltd’s LFXVIe. While the aircraft are all familiar, this precise manner of their presentation is not, a typical example of the subtle variation seen year on year.

Having simultaneous displays either side of the hard runway certainly keeps the action constant, and the Mustang routine brought excitement in spades. Nick Grey led the charge with TFC’s TF-51D Miss Velma, followed very closely by ‘Stevo’ Hinton in P-51C Princess Elizabeth from Comanche Warbirds, and George Perez behind the stick of Christian Amara’s P-51D Nooky Booky IV. The high-energy aerobatic backdrop to their low, fast runs was provided by Frédéric Akary, clearly loving every moment spent in his newly-acquired P-51D Moonbeam McSwine.

The very special link between Princess Elizabeth and Moonbeam McSwine is that both represent different blue-nosed Mustangs flown by 352nd Fighter Group ace Capt Bill Whisner, so it was all the more of a shame that only in the ‘balbo’ passes were they to be seen in formation. Here was also to be found a drawback of Legends’ multi-axis routines, as Akary flew his new mount a long way from the crowd. Given that it was the aircraft’s British debut, a separate solo on the closer display line would have been appreciated, by this reviewer at least.

One of the weekend’s outstanding pieces of flying came when Pete Kynsey joined TFC’s magnificent P-47G Thunderbolt Snafu up with B-17G Sally B for a formation pass. Coming in to hold station just off the Fortress’ wing, ‘PK’ gave a masterful demonstration of cross-control in the heavy fighter, sideslipping right the way down the display line. The four Curtiss Hawks were on good form, P-40N Little Jeanne from Christian Amara’s stable returning to join the unique TFC trio of Hawk 75A-1, P-40B and P-40F, and making perhaps the weekend’s lowest passes in the hands of Marc ‘Léon’ Mathis. Stiff competition in that regard came from Rob Davies and Paul Boschung in their Yak C-11 and Yak-9UM respectively, storming back and forth while Richard Grace gave Yak-3M ‘White 100’ a polished aerobatic work-out. A nice surprise was the sight of the Association Morane Charlie Fox’s F+W D-3801 back in its original Swiss markings, eschewing its previous identity as an Armée de l’Air MS406 — Daniel Koblet flew it beautifully.

The other member of the Swiss contingent, the TBM-3E Avenger from the Association Charlie’s Heavy (the name it bears), was of course a returnee. It was the aircraft long owned by Tony Haig-Thomas and kept at North Weald before its 2006 sale, and its more recent conversion from TBM-3R transport guise back to torpedo bomber standard. Laurent Calame gave a lively account of the beast, performed on Saturday in concert with TFC’s FM-2 Wildcat, in what was a highlight of the show. The Wildcat was itself making a comeback following resolution of the CAA paperwork issues suffered by TFC a few years ago, and Alan Wade wound the little naval fighter up quite splendidly to remind us of what we’d been missing. A shame, then, that the FM-2 (now named That Old Thing) was unavailable for a repeat on Sunday.

It may have debuted at Flying Legends last year, but Christophe Jacquard’s Sea Fury FB11 is an aircraft that needs the best of conditions truly to shine, and those it had on both afternoons this time. Taking the reins on alternate days, Christophe and Bernard Charbonnel clearly took great delight in tracing giant smoke arcs on the blue sky, and in flying through their own smoke rings. Set against this, fellow Frenchman Eric Goujon powered through his own aerobatics in The Flying Bulls’ F4U-4 Corsair, this year’s sole representative from the Red Bull-backed fleet owing to P-38 unserviceability. No matter, since Eric flew with his usual charisma.

For the two British military historic flights, it was rather a fraught weekend. Only Naval Aviation Ltd’s Sea Fury T20 represented the RN Historic Flight in the air — first the Swordfish was delayed in arriving on Saturday and could not be turned around in time for its slot, and then it sustained minor rudder damage while being towed out on Sunday morning. Repaired, LS326 departed post-show. The first day’s excellent Battle of Britain Memorial Flight fighter ‘synchro pair’, pleasingly involving newly-restored Hurricane PZ865 and Spitfire LFXVIe TE311, was followed on the next by just the Lancaster and Hurricane LF363; the ‘Spit’ planned to attend, PRXIX PM631, suffered a brake failure at Bristol Airport that morning and was grounded for repairs.

Some of the best showings came from unexpected quarters. Helge Andreassen always demonstrates Dakota Norway’s DC-3 to maximum effect, but the equal of its big, arcing manoeuvres was the tight, turning-on-a-sixpence routine by Holger Feldberg and Benno Hermann in the Junkers Ju52/3m of the Deutsche Lufthansa Berlin-Stiftung. As Anna Walker cavorted down from height in her Jungmann, so the ‘Tante Ju’ was hauled about the sky in superb fashion. Hot work, surely, given its heavy controls! The trio of Piper L-4s provided by Jeanne Frazer, Robin Roberts and Adrian Acres delighted, appearing in formation before splitting to each entertain a different section of crowdline. Further contrasts came from Shuttleworth’s Lysander and Peter Holloway’s Storch, the latter the subject of a memorable demonstration by Old Warden’s chief engineer Jean Munn. In his first display season, Jean handled the German STOL aircraft quite brilliantly — and, what’s more, covered much of the display line in so doing. Smaller aircraft like the Storch can get rather lost at Duxford, but not this time.

Inclusion at Flying Legends of the Aerostars with their six Yak-50s does get questioned by some, but I think they more than deserve their place. As an aerobatic team interlude they are ideal, given the classic nature of the aircraft (one of which, don’t forget, used to be owned by TFC) and their ever-immaculate performances. Their display may be longer than many of the warbird sequences, but so be it. To me, this highly under-rated act is always welcome.

For those of us who love Flying Legends, who find ourselves exhilarated by this event quite like no other, 2013 proved hugely enjoyable. Yes, the flying may be a little more spread out, with greater separation between take-offs, displays and landings, as a result of changes following certain incidents I need not mention a couple of years ago; yes, the ‘balbo’ may be smaller than it used to be, and this time devoid of multi-engined types. But this was a terrifically well-flown, safe show — and, above all, an invigorating one. That’s not a term one can use of many events nowadays.