Eastington Air Show!

In the morning of the 10th October, we were treated to a most unusual display of airborne dare-devilry.

We  spotted the balloon first - not unusual - but there seemed to be something close to it - binoculars showed this to be  a small helicopter.  

It looked like this was actually towing the balloon at first, but this turned out to be quite wrong.  

Next a bi-plane zoomed into the scene, in full smoke.

I thought - goodness!  I do hope that balloonist knows about this!

The plane continued to run rings and spirals around the balloon .  

What on earth was it all about??

It turned out that this was only the dessert course!  The stunt pilot, Rich Goodwin, had just completed a world first  ‘knife-edge’  manoeuvre between two hot air balloons at Gloucestershire airport, flying a specially modified Pitts Special S2S stunt plane .

The two balloons had been tethered at just 100 ft, tied together by a ribbon - which was cut by the wing as the plane turned sideways and flew between them just a few feet from the ground.

The feat had been repeated  with the two balloons flying free, at around 1500 feet.

The final part of this performance was the part that we saw - being filmed from the helicopter -  with the pilot performing aerobatics around the one balloon, experiencing up to six times the force of gravity and flying at speeds of up to 200 mph.

Interesting jobs some people have!

Jan Low

http://www.richgoodwinairshows.com