The Inaugural Pretoria Airshow at the Pretoria Fees

By Garth Calitz

The "Pretoria Fees" is a yearly festival that happens at Legends Adventure Farm during Easter weekend, just east of Pretoria at Rhino Park Airfield, a spot familiar to us in the aviation scene. The owner and main organiser, Gert Botha, decided to add an Airshow to the festivities this year. To ensure that the airshow part of the festival was successful, Gert called on David le Roux from PilotInsure to assist with the planning and execution of the event.

The morning kicked off with the customary briefings for the Pilots, Media and other essential services. Keith Fryer from AirBoss SA, the Flight Display Director (FDD), took charge of all the necessary briefings with input from Nigel Musgrave, Flight Safety Director (FSD).

The Airshow started with a cavalcade of the emergency services in the form of two response vehicles and one fire engine from FTC Modderfontein, a privately owned fire and rescue company. They were joined by an ambulance from Medi Response.

Canopies then filled the sky as four skydivers exited an Alouette III and drifted down towards the ever-growing crowd. One of the Skydivers forced the FSD to take evasive action this was thankfully the most serious incident of what became a very safe airshow.

As the last Skydiver touched down, Andrew Blackwood-Murray got airborne in his Nashua-sponsored Extra 300L. Andrew recently rejoined South African Airways as a training captain on the Airbus A320.

Sadly for the "Jet Junkies" at the show there were no full size jets taking part as the Aero L-29 Delfin that was planned had a technical snag and could not take part. However, the RC pilots quickly stepped into the gap with a wonderful RC jet display.

Andre van Zyl slowed things down a bit with a magnificent display in his Italian-built Magi Gyro. Andre rarely misses the opportunity to show off his remarkable skills at any airshow in Southern Africa.

As Andre called "Sequence complete", Nigel Hopkins and Jason Beamish ran in with a two-ship from the Goodyear Eagles' Pitts special team. Nigel and Jason have been performing together for so long, I'm sure what they do in the air has become almost instinctive.

Local Jabiru pilots got in on the action with what I believe is a South African first at an airshow. Four Jabirus took to the air and competed in a spot landing competition with varying levels of success. The old adage, "the quality of the landing is directly proportional to the number of people watching", was once again proven when some of the pilots were disqualified for landing before the mark.

North American Aviation, responsible for some of the most iconic aircraft to ever grace the sky, including the T-6 Harvard, the P-51 Mustang, the B-25 Mitchell bomber and the F-86 Sabre, were not about to be left out. Mike George and Ryno Coetzer displayed the Altitude Wealth North American Navions. These aircraft were painstakingly restored by Mike and Rayno at their company, Aircraft Inc.

Grant Timms then got the nostalgic juices flowing with a brilliant display in an Aermacchi AM.3 "Bosbok", which was widely used in the Angolan Bush War. Grant has become a staple at airshows around the country, displaying a very wide variety of aircraft, mostly vintage Warbirds.

Andre van Zyl challenged Juba Joubert to a race, not in his rather slow Gyro but in his Massarati. Juba, who is always up for a challenge, accepted and before he could pull out Nigel Musgrave made his way to the runway with a chequered flag in hand to officiate the race. Initially, the Massarati pulled clear of the Gazelle, but that gain was short-lived. Juba made short work of the sports car and won with quite a margin at the end. The Gazelle then entered into a remarkable showcase of both the pilot's and aircraft's abilities.

Elton Bondi was next up to wow the crowd in his Extra 300. Elton is a multiple National Aerobatics Champion in various Classes and is currently competing in the Advanced class, he represented South Africa in the World Championships held in Las Vegas recently.

The familiar sound of iconic nine-cylinder radial Pratt n Whitney engines filled the now cloudy skies over Rhino Park when the Puma Energy Flying Lions took to the air. The formation led by Ellis Levin proved that age is just a number when it comes to aircraft. Arnie Meneghelli and Andrew Blackwood-Murray joined Ellis in the three-ship formation.

Throughout the day, the large crowd were kept informed and entertained by the amazing commentary of Brian Emmenis and his team from Capital Sounds. Brian is celebrating 40 years of airshow commentary this year and has become an integral member of the airshow family. He has the experience and ability to not only entertain, but in the case of an accident, he has proven to keep order amongst the chaos, as was once again proven when tragedy struck the Saldanha Bay Airshow earlier in the year.

Mass formations have become few and far between in the modern SA Airshows but that changed at Rhino Park when the already airborne Harvards were joined by Nigel Hopkins and Jason Beamish in their Extra 330's as well as Mike George and Rayno Coetzer in their Navions. They formed up to the west of the field and ran in for a beautiful flypast in a seven-ship formation.

The Harvards and Navions then landed, leaving the airspace open for Nigel and Jason to get the heart rates of all the spectators raised with their high-energy Master Power display. They started their display with a massive heart drawn in the sky, followed by the trademark extremely fast aerobatic routine.

Airshows are not only entertaining but they also have a nasty habit of planting a seed in the youth, which many times leads to the young ones pursuing an aviation career. Many of us have lost sight of this fundamental truth; fortunately, watching the crowd often brings it home again.

Andre Van Zyl took to the air for his second display in the versatile Magni Gyro. Once his display was complete, he was joined by Juba Joubert in an Aloette III for a formation flypast. While in formation, Andre experienced a power problem and immediately landed once again, showing the level of professionalism exhibited by SA Airshow pilots.

Juba remained airborne, displaying the Aloette, an aircraft he has many operational hours on. Juba's flying career started in the SAAF, and he went on to fly for the Bophuthatswana Airwing and Executive Outcomes, flying a large variety of Helicopters all over the world.

In one of the few repeat performances, Elton Bondi once again displayed his skill in his Extra 300. Elton was followed by another Extra, this one was much smaller, but by no means less impressive, considering Jandre van der Schaar flew the RC aircraft in formation with his father Ivan in his full-size Boeing Stearman. As far as I can ascertain, this is the only display in the world that incorporates a full-size and an RC aircraft sharing the same airspace.

The show slowed down a bit while the Skydivers in the Alloette climbed for altitude for their second jump. This lull allowed for the first batch of departures of aircraft that had flown in for the day, which was mainly Savannah Aircraft that are based at Kroon Airfield.

To make things a bit more interesting, the skydivers tried to land in a jumping castle; only the highly experienced Graham Field managed to land on target, with the other jumpers landing close but not on target.

The firefighters from FTC Modderfontein were called into action when fires were lit in tyres alongside the runway. They managed to get both fires extinguished in under two minutes, which is pretty impressive.

Aldo Naude took to the air in an AG Aviation Air Tactor 502XP crop sprayer. This remarkable aircraft is capable of carrying 2.5 tons of water that can be sprayed on crops or bulk dropped on fires. While Aldo was flying his display tractor driver thought it was a good idea to start mowing the grass next to the runway. Aldo decided to drop his full load on the tractor, soaking the poor driver to the bone.

Jason and Nigel once again took to the sky this time in home-built Vans RV8's. In the past, the Raptors flew in a four-ship formation, but sadly, many of the pilots who made up the Raptors have left our shores to find employment elsewhere in the world. Jason and Nigel, however, flew a magnificent display in these extremely popular aircraft.

A beautiful bare metal Cessna C140 had been parked front and centre on the display line, Brian Emmenis explained that it was there to treat a Korean War veteran to a flight. The 96-year-old ex-Mustang pilot was assisted into the C140. Eugene du Preez started taxing out but somehow got the left wheel stuck in a hole. Eugene then got out to push the aircraft out of the hole, and our veteran decided this was an opportunity to relive his youth. He took off rather erratically and almost crashed into the fire truck that was sent out on the runway in case he didn't make it back safely. After some crazy passes, the Cessna settled on the runway and the veteran climbed out only to expose himself as none other than Elton Bondi.

Once the excitement had settled down after the aircraft "theft", Ellis Levin and Arnie Meneghelli took off in the Hired Gun Pitts Specials, they were joined by Andrew Blackwood-Murray in his Extra 300. The now Hired Gun team made their airshow debut 40 years ago, then sponsored by Winfield Cigarettes, flown by Ellis' dad, Scully with Jeff Birch and Chris Rademan.

The shadows were lengthening and people started to pack up when they suddenly stopped as the sound of the Vietnam War was heard. The Bell UH-1 "Huey" had started up, accompanied by a Gazelle and an Alouette III. This display was about to make its first appearance at an airshow and what a display it was.

The very successful Airshow was closed off with repeat performances by Grant Timms in the Bosbok and the Altitude Wealth Navion team, followed by one last jump by the skydive team. What a wonderful way to spend Easter Monday, I'm sure everyone will be back next year to do it all again.