Air Power over Hampton Roads 6/21-22.08

Last week I attended the Festival of Flight which took place at the Suffolk Executive Airport, inSuffolk VA. It was quite enjoyable, and I still have to write up my article and post photos, which I hope to do in another couple of days.

Today, Saturday, I attended the Air Power over Hampton Roads show at Langley Airforce Base.

There's no comparing the two shows, the one at Suffolk was a civilian thing, and had several hundred attendees over the weekend, the Air Power show of course had plenty of Military planes, as well as civilians, and dozens of shops, and tens of thousands of visitors. But I enjoyed them both and to the aircraft enthusiast they were both worth going to.

Nancy Lynn
A bittersweet return to Langley AFB for me... as the last time I'd gone, a couple of years ago, I had seen Nancy Lynn, the aerobatic pilot, who died in a crash just a couple of months later.

Anyway, I took lots of photos, but I'm not in the mood to do anything with them today as I've had too much sun and have developed a headache in consequence... I thought I'd been well prepared with a hat, sunglasses, and a water-sprayer, but as I've gotten older my susceptibility to bright sunshine and high heat has gotten worse...

Long line
I must say I entered the air show in a rather bemused fashion...I had to wait in my car in line 45 minutes before getting from the West Gate of Langley Airfield to the place where they were having us park... there were shuttle buses from there, but I'm willing to bet 99% of the people there didn't realize that til they were walking back on sore feet towards their cars...

Security Gate
So after we parked our cars and headed toward the plane area, there was the security gate to be got through. I was a bit nervous - I'd purchased a mini-backpack the day before, in which to keep my water sprayer and a bottle of water, and the signs leading up to the security checkpoint said "No backpacks". But purses were allowed, so I was hoping I could pass that thing off as purse - it was about that size. Not to mention the fact that the only things in it were the two water bottles.

So we as a crowd are walking through roped off lanes toward the security checkpoint - which broadened out into five lines with tables and metal detectors to step through, and as we walked through, I, at least, passed by two soldiers stationed at various points, chanting, "No pocket knives, no pocket knives."

So, I get up to the checkpoint, and I have to take off my ballcap, and my camera, as well as my minibackpack, and put them in a basket. I also have to put my keys in the basket.

And on my keys was a fingernail clipper.

Which was confiscated.

I just laughed. I'm a 5f ft 4 middle-aged woman, swallowed up amongst a crowd of ten thousand or more...not one of whom would be at all intimidated by a woman waving a 1-inch nail file around, screaming to be allowed to be the first in line to pay $7 for a hamburger.

So the soldier took the deadly weapon off my keyring and threw it into a bag underneath the table. And I glanced into that bag and lo and behold there were a couple of fancy pocket knives in there... and I'm thinking to myself... I am not the most noticing person in the world... but I saw several signs that said "No pocket knives" as we were headed up here, and I heard at least two soldiers chanting non-stop, "No pocket knives," and yet at least two people had ignored this and tried to bring pocket knives onto the field.

And, I dunno... a guy waving a three-inch, sharp blade around, trying to be the first in line to buy a $7 hamburger, would seem to me to be much more intimidating than some poor schmuck with a fingernail clipper.

On my out, I thought vaguely about asking for my fingernail clipper back, but there was still a line of people coming in (I left about 1 pm...) and I decided there was no point... after all they only cost a dollar or so...but it was just the inanity of it that annoyed me...

Stereotypical Girl's Store
Another thing that got my knickers in a twist was one of the commercial booths - I took photos of it and will post them tomorrow... in addition to aircraft-related stores (or rather tables or tents with merchandise spread out) there were also other things - one of which was a table selling things for little girls -- hair ribbons, feather boas, etc. (and not a thing related to aviation on it.) And you could get your photo taken, sticking your head into one of two wooden placards - one with a Cinderella torso, the other some fancily dressed woman getting out of a limo at the Emmy awards or something...

And I've got to admit this torqued me. Give little girls something a bit more substantial and high flying to aim for!!! One of those torsos should have been an aviator dressed like Bessie Coleman, for example, and the other should have been dressed like Amelia Earheart, Jacqueline Cochran...or even a Thunderbird pilot! But nope. It was the same stereotypical, fairy-tale crap that it always is....underlining to girls that obsession with appearance, and seeking boyfriends...or at least a baby daddy... is everything...

Well, that's a long rant for someone with a headache.... I'll stop now.

I'll be posting photos tomorrow...

Festival of Flight, Suffolk, VA June 14-15,08

Well, I'm a bit late with the news, but the Festival of Flight took place this weekend, Sat and Sun, June 14-15, 08 at the Suffolk Executive Airport, Suffolk VA

Here's the website: http://virginiaflyin.org/index.htm

I went, took a lot of photos, talked to a few people.

What with the sunshine and the humidity (it started out nice, but by the end of the day...) I was plumb worn out, so I'll be sharing photos and info starting tomorrow.

Quilts honor the WASP

(First off...this blog hasn't been updated in a few months...health issues have held me back. However, hopefully from now on I'll be making daily updates again.)

Just added a new interview to Winged Victory, aka You Fly, Girl!

http://volcanoseven.com/YouFlyGirl/Interviews/JudyWolff.html

It's an interview with Judy Wolff, a woman who, first with the help of her daughter (for the daughter's Girl Scout project) and now on her own, is making quilts honoring each of the WASP classes, and the 39 WASP who died serving their country.

Two of the quilts are completed and donated to the WASP musuem, as will be each subsequent quilt.

Wingwalking women

I decided to see today what kind of information the web had on women pilots, and barnstormers, during the pioneer years.

PBS.Kids has a page on barnstormers.

In most barnstorming shows, men piloted the planes. When women participated, they most often performed stunts such as wing walking. Gladys Ingle was famous for shooting arrows at a target while standing on the top wing of a Curtiss Jenny--and for changing planes in mid-air. Georgia "Tiny" Broderick was the first woman to parachute from a plane--at 2,000 feet--in 1913. She went on to perform over 1,110 jumps.

Some women, such as ...Bess[ie] Coleman, didn't want to walk on top of airplanes--they wanted to fly them. Coleman's performance at the Chicago Checkerboard Airdome in 1922 was the first ever given by a black woman. Mabel Cody competed with men as well--by running her own flying circus. She performed stunts as well, including dancing on the wing of a flying plane.

Opencockpit.com has several photos, and an interview with, a modern-day wingwalker, Margaret Stivers, as well as a few paragraphs on the pioneers:

Ethel Dare was the first woman to change planes in the air. Pretty and petite she was billed as the "1920 Aerial Sensation," the "Queen of the Air" or provocatively as "The Flying Witch." She had been a flying trapeze performer with the Barnum And Bailey Circus.

Miss Dare delighted in standing on the edge of a wing and then would suddenly fall backwards into space. A length of rope would suddenly hault her death plunge. Then she would climb back, hand over hand, to perform other stunts. Her specialty, and all of the daredevils had specialities, was the "Iron Jaw Spin." Dangling from the end of a rope with a special mouthpiece clutched between her teeth, Ethel would twirl dizzily in the plane's propwash. Up the rope she would climb for a daring series of calisthenics as the plane circled the fairgrounds.

DamnInteresting.com has a brief mention of Rosalie Gordon.

Obviously, it was also a dangerous pursuit. As barnstorming's popularity grew, the performances became increasingly elaborate and risky. In 1924, stuntperson Rosalie Gordon's parachute was tangled in the landing gear of a plane; she was rescued by fellow barnstormer Clyde "Upside-Down" Pangborn from the Gates Flying Circus. Most barnstorming accidents, however, ended less happily.

Readers of the theaerodrome.com forums give this info about the colors of planes in which the women flew:

Gladys Roy. Entire airframe apparently covered with exotic murals! Only thing clearly visible looks like a lion's head, but ortho film shows little detail.

Mable (sic) Cody Flying Circus. Dark fuselage and vertical tail, remainder apparently natural fabric. Illegible inscription on rudder. Polished metal cowling.

Lillian Boyer. Tinted photo shows bright green fuselage and tail, wheels in an indeterminate colour, red or orange. Any underside detail?

Gladys Ingle often worked with a Jenny shown in a painting as having blue fuselage, wheels and fin, yellow wings and tailplane, and red-white-dark blue striped rudder. No. 27 in circle on fuselage. Reproduced too small on the Internet for heraldic-style fuselage badge and white inscription across upper wing to be legible.

Women in Aviation News, 3/25/08

BA's first female pilot at controls for historic T5 flight

This is Captain Lynn Barton who will make aviation history by piloting the first flight into Heathrow Terminal 5 when it opens for business on Thursday.

Her Boeing 747 - flight number BA026 - carrying 350 passengers will arrive at the £4.3billion terminal from Hong Kong at 4.50am.

Captain Barton, 51, who became British Airways' first female pilot in 1987, is "absolutely thrilled" at being chosen for the job.

She applied to operate the inaugural T5 flight last month while she was on holiday in Barbados.

"It was my husband's idea to bid for the flight but the timing meant I had to tear myself off the beach to find a computer so that I could apply for the airline's flight-bidding system," she said. "I never thought I'd be in with a chance of actually getting the flight."

She had to wait, however, until she returned to Britain to find she had won it. "I was absolutely thrilled. T5 has been the focus of the airline's future for several years now and to operate the first flight is a huge honour. I can't wait."

See link for complete article.

Women pilots: A weapon to be used

by Airman 1st Class Erica Stewart
36th Operations Group Public Affairs

3/24/2008 - ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam (AFPN) -- "This is not a time when women should be patient. We are in a war and we need to fight it with all our ability and every weapon possible. Women pilots, in this particular case, are a weapon waiting to be used," said Eleanor Roosevelt, former first lady of the United States.

These words, spoken in 1942, were proven true when the Women Airforce Service Pilots were founded and played a pivotal role in World War II.

That statement again holds true today with many female Air Force pilots deploying around the world, proving to be an invaluable weapon in the war on terrorism.

See link for complete article

Women engineers inspire young people at Attleboro museum forum

ATTLEBORO -- Ten-year-old Savanna Nelson said she thinks computer animation is "cool" and something she wouldn’t mind exploring.

Nicole Choiniere, 11, a fellow student at Community School in North Attleboro, said she really liked hearing a woman’s story about her career as an engineer working on radar in connection with space and her friend, a female astronaut.

Katherine Pariseau, a freshman at Bishop Feehan, is pondering engineering as a career, possibly computer or mechanical engineering.

The young women were among roughly 40 people — about half of them girls — to attend the "Envision Engineering" forum last week at the Women At Work Museum on Country Street

See link for complete article.

AND FINALLY:

Air Force Portal Website BEIJING (Xinhua): China’s air force is to recruit 30 female pilot cadets this year. They will become part of a reserve force of women astronauts, according to an officer in charge of pilot recruitment. ...

I present only this paragraph, because each time I click on the link that is supposed to take me to this news page, I end up either at Google or Amazon. I can only assume, therefore, that the Chinese government doesn't want people accessing this webpage.

Videos of female martial artists

More of a dance choreography than karate, but...


Karate match - full contact, no protective gear


Karate tournment in Bavaria - criticised as lacking in fundamentals


Kata championship - Tokyo


A little bit of fencing


Fencing two - this is a bit silly, not sure where it's from...

Remembering the WASP

March is Women's History Month. It doesn't seem to get the media coverage of other history months, but that's life in the big city.

Anyway, here's a blog entry from KiwiBirdKayaker, remembering the WASP during Women's History Month.

Remember the WASP of WWII