Weightlessness and mid-air feats as the Blue Angels prep for Bethpage Air Show
FARMINGDALE, N.Y. (PIX11) -- Of the hundreds of air shows in the United States, the fifth largest is here in our region.
The Bethpage Air Show at Jones Beach is this weekend, and on Friday, the headliners of the show did their practice flights for the event. The U.S. Navy's Blue Angels are best known for their seven fighter jets, and the aerobatics they perform. However, they couldn't do any of it without their eighth plane -- a C-130 cargo aircraft that does some remarkable maneuvering of its own.
The plane is fondly nicknamed “Fat Albert.” It transports the 60 people and 35,000 tons of cargo that are needed to keep the Blue Angels squadron flying, from location to location, from the squadron's home base in Pensacola, Florida. Once the squadron and their supplies are off-loaded, Fat Albert does its own high-precision flying at airshows.
"Fat Albert is pretty much a school bus on roller coaster tracks, when we go do our demonstration," said Joseph Gunther, a staff sergeant in the U.S. Marines, who grew up in Commack, Long Island. He and a team of fellow Marines (unlike the Blue Angel fighter jet pilots, who are all in the Navy, the entire crew of the Fat Albert are Marines) are responsible for keeping the aircraft in a condition so fine-tuned that it's capable of unusually challenging mid-air feats.
"We'll do a bit of pushover," SSgt. Gunther said, describing a climbing and leveling off maneuver the plane does in its mid-air demonstration, "so we'll feel some zero Gs, negative Gs, so we'll float up in our seats a bit, so it'll be pretty fun."
He made it sound so easy. PIX11 News went along for the flight, and the zero gravity that Gunther described almost seemed unreal. All of the passengers and crew onboard, with the exception of the pilots, who were strapped in, floated in space, with legs and arms up in the air, for about seven seconds. The unreal feeling of weightlessness made the zero-G period feel a lot longer. It was unforgettable.
The practice flights of Fat Albert and the other Blue Angel planes on Friday were all to preview the Jones Beach Bethpage Airshow.
The Friday flights were at Republic Airport, about nine miles north of Jones Beach. Many fans of the Blue Angels came out the airstrip in Farmingdale, to get a taste of the weekend's airshow.
Beth Hughes said that the sight of the Blue Angel planes, which are F/A-18Es, is just the beginning.
"You spot them," she said, "and with the sound waves, it's awesome. It's awesome."
Chriscarla Etienne is in elementary school, and wants to be a pilot when she grows up. She said that the most amazing thing to her, when she watches the planes maneuver, is how swiftly and high they go.
"When they were going fast," she said, she was awestruck. "After that, they went up," she said,
She's a young fan, and her dad said that she'd insisted on seeing this weekend's show.
"I think I'm going to have to get up at four in the morning to go there," said Carlos Etienne, the girl's father, referring to the huge, possibly record-setting crowds that are expected. "To beat the traffic," he said.
The Bethpage Air Show at Jones Beach is on Saturday and Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.