Awesome Adventures in Alaska: My First Alaskan Airshow

I've been fortunate enough to get to see 4 3/4 other air shows before this one (3 in LaCrosse, WI, 1 that I attended in Wichita, and 2 that I didn't attend but saw parts of from my house, including while the movers were packing up my house as I was moving to Alaska), but this was my first in Alaska. The traffic getting to the airshow was definitely the worst at this one, but knowing the right people got us on the Air Force base and in place to see a couple demonstrations before the Thunderbirds did their show. I'm not sure we would have made it in time otherwise!

It was very hard to choose which photos to include here because while many are of the same thing, they're each a little different and neat in their own way. So they didn't get narrowed down as much as I was expecting and hoping to be able to. I think I'll just let the photos (and videos) speak for themselves, and I'll just interject tidbits of info. as necessary.

An F-22 demonstration... impressive aircraft!

Straight up!

Straight up again!

A "low and slow" maneuver...

See the F-22 in action:

Thunderbirds 7-28-12 C from Mary-Beth Schreck on Vimeo.

Onto the US Air Force Thunderbirds... these are just 3 of the 6 jets before takeoff.

One of my favorite shots of the day.

Wanna see these two in action? Here ya go! I'm gonna leave this type of flying to the experts. ;)

Thunderbirds 7-28-12 D from Mary-Beth Schreck on Vimeo.

Here they're demonstrating how tightly they can do a 360 degree circle, both horizontally and vertically. Pretty neat.

Thunderbirds 7-28-12 E from Mary-Beth Schreck on Vimeo.

Landing gear down...

I think this is my favorite video that I took at the airshow. If you watch carefully (you might have to play it a couple times), you'll see the camera shake at about 8 seconds into the video. I know about this maneuver, and have been known to pride myself on the fact that I know it's coming and not reacting like this. Well, they got me this day. And knowing what happened there still makes me laugh when I watch the video. I tried to put myself in the shoes of one of our enemies, and I can't even imagine how frightened I'd be to see (or not see) these guys coming. It's very cool to see them in a friendly setting on US soil (it always gets my adrenaline pumping!), but ignoring their real purpose would be selfish and thankless. Anyway, yes, you could say I had one of "those" moments where a different and bigger reaction seemingly comes out of nowhere as I watched their demonstration this time.

Thunderbirds 7-28-12 F from Mary-Beth Schreck on Vimeo.