When hunches pay off...

Friday qualified as another "WOW!" day - no question about it! I said before I think that I was hoping to make another trip to Lincolnshire - to RAF Scampton this time to watch a Red Arrows practise. A week ahead of time I booked a budget hotel room for the Thursday night - a flexible rate one meaning that I had until midday on Thursday to cancel. I kept an eye on the weather, crossing fingers desperately, and it looked....well, OK is about the best you can say - I knew it was going to be a gamble. On Wednesday evening I popped a tweet across to the ever helpful "Red 8" - Flt. Lt. Martin Pert - to see if he could tell me if they were likely to be flying on Friday - like lightning the very enthusiastic response "Absolutely!" came back, and we were on!

"Red 8" - aka Perty

What I didn't say beforehand was that I had a little hunch I was working on which was why I was aiming at Friday 28th for my visit. Earlier in the year they'd said something somewhere about ideally wanting to get their first practise with all 9 of them airborne together (known as a "9-Ship" display) done by the end of February....and I knew that until the start of last week, they'd not done this. As the week moved through with nobody reporting having seen a 9, I knew that the odds were more and more in favour of them being keen to do it on Friday...I could have been wrong of course, but as it turned out...

Showing off the fantastic new tail design...

...I was spot on!

Initially on arrival at Scampton things didn't look hopeful. I drove around to refresh my memory of where things were, and the best places to view from without silly high MOD fences getting in the way, and by the time I parked up in my chosen spot (a small car park not far from the base) it was progressing from "a bit misty" to "distinctly foggy". Indeed when I walked up to the fence near the end of the runway I couldn't even see the windsock, never mind any evidence of the line of Red Hawks that I knew were out there somewhere! A few tweets were exchanged with others who were waiting hopefully around the area too (well, on the rare occasions I could capture that rarest of beasts the "Scampton data signal" that is!) and nobody seemed sure what was going on... Eventually though we got word - an 8-ship was going up "now"! I'd met up with another lady - Sam - by this time, and we hastily grabbed camera gear and legged it up the road to our chosen spot just as they took off! Thankfully we had a few minutes while they regrouped to regain our breath and our composure before they made they first few passes over, and a few clicks of the shutter later they went out of sight again and I took the chance to check my shot to see who was missing....and to my surprise....it was.....nobody! Wow - my hunch was absolutely right, and Sam and I just grinned at each other in absolute delight.

I had to count them about four times to be absolutely sure...!

Although some of that sortie was flown quite high, they did drop low enough as time went on to make some decent formation shots possible, and the first thing that came to light was just how tidy it was all looking - it just goes to show that the meticulous attention to detail that goes into the winter training really does pay off...

Just after lunch (I'd moved the car to a spot closer in by this time) I once again heard the distinctive sound of 9 Hawks starting up, I was on my own by this stage so again grabbed my gear and headed back to the fence-line. This time I was in time to see them taxi out, and thanks to the runway in use they came right past - close enough that I was spotted by "Red 2" (Flt. Lt Stewart Campbell) and got a wave!

Red 2 - Flt. Lt. Stewart Campbell

It might amuse you to note that it's not only in the air that the Reds do things with great precision - even the taxi-out from the line to the runway is done in the same way...

Sq. Ldr. Jim Turner leading out the team...

Impressive, eh? Once they were airborne it became apparent that they were going to run through the second half of the display this time - which meant from my perspective lots of nice close passes pretty much overhead, and at various times Reds 6 - 9 coming straight at me, like this...

Red 6 - Flt Lt James McMillan - head on!

...yes, seeing that bearing down on you at great speed through a telephoto lens is bloody scary! In fact they ran through the second half twice - meaning LOTS of those shots!

I'm definitely planning another trip up to Scampton before the Reds depart to Cyprus for "Operation Spinghawk", and am also hoping to see them do a practise at another base in a few weeks too. If I needed any further confirmation that my choice of lens was the right one then without question Friday would have given that - I'm thoroughly looking forward to using it more and more as the year progresses!

Robyn

Red 7 - Flt. Lt. Mark Lawson