Las Vegas-Nellis AFB (NV) (USA)

The Aviation Nation Air Show (“75 Years of Airpower”)

12 - 13 November 2016

Credits: Joost de Wit

I will give you a (personal) review of my very first visit to this two-day airshow, which may or may not help you during next editions of Aviation Nation. Crowds, parking and access.

This year more than 300.000 spectators visited Aviation Nation. Saturday was significantly busier than Sunday. On the first day, people were not admitted to the airshow after 1 PM. It was just too busy ...

The airshow has two entrance points, which opened at 9 AM. If you are arriving by car, you will have to park at the huge parking lots of the Las Vegas Motor Speedway just north of the airbase. From here you will be transported to the base by shuttle busses. If you are not arriving by car, you can enter the base via the main gate opposite of E Craig Road. Lucky for us, the main gate is located just across the street from our hotel. Also from the main gate you will be transported to the show grounds by shuttle busses. The big benefit of going to the show via the main gate is that the queues are much shorter than when going via the Speedway. Most of the waiting at the main gate was caused by the security process. Keep in mind that bringing radio scanners and (large quantities of) food and drinks are not allowed. Officially, large backpacks aren’t permitted either, but the security staff wasn’t too strict on that. Not being able to bring your own food presents some challenges: long lines around lunchtime and extremely overpriced food.

Weather: On Saturday the day started with blue skies, but as time went by, more and more high clouds came in, which eventually blocked the sun. On Sunday we had nothing but clear blue skies all day long.

Static display: As with most American airshows, don’t expect many clean static photos. The only exceptions were the HH-60s on the north end (best time: late afternoon), a couple of fighters on the south end (best time: early morning) and the Thunderbirds in the middle of the show grounds best time: from noon onwards).

Flying display: The flying display (including the sequence of performers) on both days was almost identical. Flying began around 10 AM and lasted only about 4 hours. At 2 PM it was time for the final act: the Thunderbirds. Traditionally, they don’t just close Aviation Nation, but also their show season since Nellis is their home base. Together with the preflight duties and start-up, their demonstration lasted more than an hour. Around 3.15 PM the last aircraft touched down again. The biggest disadvantage of the flying display is that you will have backlight in the morning and the first part of the afternoon, which is exactly when most of the action happened. If you don’t like backlight, the best option would be photographing the planes on the taxiway at the north side after they landed on and vacated runway 03. Here the sun will be in your back from 11 AM onwards. The only flag on the play is that you will not be able to catch the planes that land on runway 21, which was more than half of all performers. With the light winds on both days, runway usage was quite unpredictable. Fortunately the venerable Phantom treated us with a landing on runway 03, so we got a perfect way to say goodbye after one of its final public performances, just one month before retirement.

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