Every year, beginning October, the cove between Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz set the stage for a spectacular airshow. As part of the Fleet Week, which is organized by the U.S. Navy, Marine Corp and Coast Guard since 1981, the show attracts more than one million spectators.
This year’s airshow offered more than 4.5 hours of flying-action with beautiful, bright blue sky and especially no fog. Thus, all participants showed their high program.
Three Jet-Display-Teams visited the show in 2017. The shortest arrival had the Patriots Jet Team. This private owned team with six L-39 Albatros is based just a few flight minutes from San Francisco in Byron/California.
Some of the team’s pilots were formerly part of the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds, U.S. Navy Blue Angels and Royal Canadian Air Force Snowbirds. They have logged over 105,000 hours of flight time and performed in more than 1500 air shows.
The Patriots showed a very dynamic show with several loops, spectacular cross-overs and some very, very low high-speed passes.
Also part of the show was the pride of Canada: The Canadian Forces 431 Air Demonstration Squadron, better known as Snowbirds.
With their nine Canadair CT-114 Tutor aircraft, the team showed a 30-minutes performance full of elegance and precision. Once again, they lived up to their reputation of being one of the best display-teams in the world.
The daily conclusion of the flying-program were the legendary United States Navy Blue Angels with their six F/A-18 Hornet.
Another remarkable highlight was the display of a United Airlines Boeing 747. Several low fly-bys in different configurations with tight turns left the audience breathless.
The airshow was topped off with a rescue-demo of the U.S. Coast Guard, the F-16-Demo from the West Coast Demo Team, Sean D. Tucker and the Lucas Oil Team.
Enough words, here are some pix ...