Fly-in at Grosseto

[Gregory]

Yesterday GAVS, the Italian Vintage Aircraft Society, held its annual meeting at Grosseto AFB, hosted by the local 4th Stormo of the Italian Air Force. We had some 120 people in attendance.

Several members and friends elected to fly in, and the line-up comprised a number of WW2 vintage aircraft:
- T-6 D-FEBA
- T-6 I-SSEP (locally based, awaiting paperwork for first flight, but taxied in!)
- L-5B I-AEGB
- Avia L.3 in pre-war Italian colours

Also, former Italian Army L-18 I-LABO, in civvy, and various vintage Italian lightplanes (F.4 I-ALBJ, F-8 I-TRIP, F.15 I-PICC) and a couple of GA types.

The Wing Commander was an impeccable host and showed us around the 20th Squadron flightline (F-104S and TF-104G), 9th Squadron hangar (Eurofighter 2000, whose performance he described as exhilarating) and the 4° RMV maintenance hangar (including an ex Swiss Vampire, various Italian vampire wrecks and some 104s).

And, as added attraction, at the end of the day we were treated to a behind-the-doors visit to a nearby collection of WW2 vehicles, mainly German, witha sprinkling of Italian, American and Canadian.

All in all, a great day. I hope to obtain photos (yes, I had a camera; no, I was too busy to use it) and to figure out how to post them.

Gregory

[DaveM2]

Gregory

Sounds interesting , Vampire wrecks....I take it the type is well represented in Italian Museums and it is not likely they will be saved ?
O/T ... Any German tanks in the collection....or only 'light' types ?

Dave

[Gregory]

Off the top of my head
- original DH-built two-seater at Italian AF Museum
- original Macchi-built single-seater at Science Museum, Milan
- composite of Italian-built machines as gate guardian at Amendola AFB
- original DH-built Swiss machine at Rivolto AFB
- original DH-built Swiss machine at Grosseto AFB, being modified to Italian standard for ITAF Museum
- wrecks of Italian built aircraft at Grosseto AFB, to be rebuilt into a composite machine for local base collection.

All static.

Gregory