What a day to be in the midwest!

I spent the day watching three P-51 Mustangs (Gunfighter, Sweet Revenge, and a P-51C red-tail from the Tuskegee Airmen) fly down the runway 200 feet in the air at full song. Jets may shake your house as they fly over, but the sound a Merlin makes is music to my ears. It sent chills up and down my spine to see these three beautiful planes following each other and when I say beautiful it is an understatement. P-51's have always been my favorite plane even as a kid so to see all of them screaming away was a dream come true. Also flying around was a P-47 Thunderbolt (dark green with a weird animal painted on the front of it), a B-25, and an F4U Corsair.

Closing out the day was the Blue Angels. This was the first time I have ever seen them in person and they did not disappoint. Their performance was without a doubt one of the single coolest things I've ever seen. The amount of professionalism they show and how close they fly together was nothing short of incredible.

What a day.

 

I remember being in our house in Sweetwater, TX in 1955 or so and hearing an airplane fly over the house. My father yells, "that is a P-51" and runs out to the back yard. Sure enough, it was a P-51D owned by one of the local ranchers. You could buy one for $5-15K back then, but our house only cost $14K, so out of reach. My father flew P-47Ds in WW-II and was flying P-51Ds at Shaw Field when I was born. He was base commander at Avenger Field (actually Sweetwater AF Station), WW-II home of the WASPs, and regularly flew a B-25H to get his four hours a month for flight pay. The good old days.

Taz
Terry Phillips