Saturday Indy airshow canceled due to rain

[WIXerGreg]

Hopefully this will help some people that were planning on going, I just got back from spending over 3 hours in the truck and got turned away at the gate. Not sure about the show area, but the parking areas had alot of standing water which was probably the main reason for canceling. Tomorrow's forcast doesn't look that promising either so hopefully some local WIXers might be able to post an update when tomorrow's show gets closer.

[mustangdriver]

You just saved me some time and money man. Thank you very much.

[WIXerGreg]

Glad I was able to help someone!

Are you going to go if they run tomorrow?

[mustangdriver]

I am going to try. Are you heading over. I may have to work, but if I am off I am going.

[WIXerGreg]

If it looks like they'll have the show I'll definitely be heading back again tomorrow. I'll definitely be checking WIX, the ASB forum and the show website before hopping back in the truck again though!

[mustangdriver]

Cool, if it looks like it will work out we should try and meet up somewhere.

[WIXerGreg]

I'll probably be there pretty much from 8-6 so it shouldn't be hard to work out.

Anybody remember the downpour in '06?

[WIXerGreg]

Update: one of the Ramp Rats posted on the ASB forum that there was a road being built to be able to park cars on one of the runways tomorrow instead of in the grass. Sounds promising!

[P51Mstg]

I'm there and its pretty much been raining non stop here (5 miles away) for the last couple hours with severe thunderstorm warnings of hail, high winds, etc.

I'm heading over early, if it looks OK, I'll hang out, Last weather report was 60% chance of rain and more than likely gray skies, hence no pictures that would be worth taking. I may just stop by Dayton again on the way home.

Recently acquired (Former CAF) P-82 looks OK, sitting about where Betty Jo was at. Paint in gloss black was pretty funky looking. Not very even on the gloss, volunteers must have been learning to paint on it. There is a NICE looking and brightly marked P-80 there that I don't remember in the past Nice plane.... The good old days..

Mark H

[WIXerGreg]

Yeah, some of that storm was pretty nasty. By the Weather Channel site's future map prediction that storm should be out of there by 2 AM or so. Hopefully that will be the end of it.

I actually had the idea of heading east and spending today in Dayton and then heading back to the show tomorrow, but I was almost home again when I thought of it .

[IndyJen]

Hey WIXer Greg, it was good to see you out there today!

The weather cleared up, the parking was solved, and we had a good day's show flying out there, and a reasonable-size crowd, too, from the look of it.

Hot stuff sure had all the visitors she could handle! Losing the Saturday show didn't do us any good, but all in all, it was a fine day's airshowing today. The warbirds got a good 1.2 of flying, a good portion of which was orbiting off to the east of the field, waiting to be cleared in. It's not a bad day's work, flying along behind a B-17, who is behind the B-25. Hot Stuff was flying strong, loud and clean, too.

Good to see, also, FlyingIllini, who hopefully will have pictures, and who was the one other WIXer I recall? Drat it, I can't come up with your handle.

We're looking for more shows, now. Anybody out there needing a nice bomber for your show? Crowd pleaser, discount rates!

[WIXerGreg]

It turned out to be a great day for an airshow. A big thanks to all who came together to overcome the parking problems and get the show on!

It was great talking with Jenny, Paula and rest of the Hot Stuff crew!

I posted a few of my pictures on the other Indy show thread. Hopefully we'll see some more.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=36127&p=364888#p364888

[Trey Carroll]

Storms were 'a brewing Friday night...

[Steve Nelson]

Cool pic! What's the status of Tom Woods' warbird collection since he passed away?

SN

[DocThrock]

Cool pic! What's the status of Tom Woods' warbird collection since he passed away?

SN

My buddy talked to Tom Woods Mustang's pilot and he said the Woods family had no intention of parting with any aircraft and that they intended to have them all flown. That was about the only good bit of news during the rain out.

Saturday sure was a mess. I parked my motorhome in the grass at the north end before the gates opened. When I left Sunday evening, there was still about 1 inch of water around it, and it took many tries to get the pig out of the mud.

Fortunately for us, before that early Saturday evening Thunderstorm, we were able to coax one of the local exec hangar owners to allow us to put the C45 inside. Man, it looked like all Hell was going to let loose, and it sure did dump a bunch more water. I was glad to hear that there were no reports of the 60 mile an hour winds or 5 inch hail like they had west of Indiana. In fact I didn't hear of any damage anywhere on the field. That was a bit of good news.

Saturday wasn't a total loss for us. Matt Younkin had some engine trouble on his Friday practice. By Saturday afternoon when the sun came out, his mechanic had installed a new carb and of course a maintenance flight was in order. We packed up the C45 and "flew chase" with Matt's Beech 18, which performed perfectly. The Jelly Belly Interstate Cadet also flew as did multiple Mustangs (Horsemen giving rides?) late afternoon. It seemed there were many Huey sorties in the area until the last minute before the evening storm. During all that, we were busy eating, and climbing in Mustangs, T6s, the B25, the C123, a Huey and others, and schmoozing with other crews and volunteers. You meet the nicest people at airshows.

I was actually able to talk to the owner of our C45's grandfather quite a lot during the wash out. Harold Plunkitt was a ball turret gunner who had 56 B17 missions out of North Africa. Not all of them successful, he described being left for dead... twice. It was fascinating to hear his stories.. when he wasn't over at Yankee Lady crawling around, critiquing and educating the crew about their turret and other stations.

We had a great time at the Indy show. It was Jordan's first chance to fly his C45 in a show and he did a fine job. I think he had a good time and was very happy to show the plane with his family. He was a bit disappointed that his wife and two sons weren't able to stay to see his first time flying in a show. However, to make up for it, Jordan flew over his son's soccer matches on his way back to home base and did a couple passes.