Warbird Information Exchange

Slaton was a small airshow but still a lot of fun. It was hot and windy...perfect airshow weather. Kristine and I thought it was very much worth the 456 mile round trip. In addition to a good airshow, we got to catch up with my good friend Gary Austin.

I didn't think about it until I was nearly back at the house but the last time I went to an airshow at Slaton was September 6, 1987. It was shortly after Jack Gaulding (long time CAF Wildcat pilot among other planes) and Ned Sanders had been killed in a T-28 crash in New Mexico and they were naming the Slaton airport after Jack. They had also paid tribute to him at the Breckenridge show earlier that May, a couple of weeks after Jack was killed.

At the Slaton show that year, Howard Pardue flew his Wildcat routine in memory of Jack. Bill Arnot was there in the B-25, Jay Cullum in the T-34 as well as a slew of other planes. As I recall it, Jay gave Howard a ride back to Dallas in the T-34 so he could catch an airliner to another airshow in some other part of the country that he was flying that same weekend.

Oddly enough, my Dad and I rode the motorcycle to that airshow also.

The pictures are a little out of order but I'm honestly too tired to arrange them in any way but this!

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Brad

Looks like it was a great show Brad, thanks for the pics!

I'm very intrigues by those taildragger projects/Japanese replicas....what on earth are they? T-6s? Yaks? They look very very cool.

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Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG".
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

"It's his plane, he spent the money to restore it, he can do with it what he wants. I will never understand what's hard to comprehend about this." - kalamazookid, 20/08/2013
"The more time you spend around warbirds the sooner you learn nothing, is simple." - JohnB, 24/02/22

It was cool to see you and Kristine as well, Brad. I enjoyed watching the show as well. It wasn't the best airshow of all time, but you know, sometimes its these little shows that make the best memories.

Gary

Nice pics Brad, thanks for sharing them. Looks like you and Gary had a good time! Wish I would have been in west Texas this weekend so I could have gone too...

The F9F Cougar is looking better than when I saw her last time at the Pate Museum.

-Derek

I think they started out as Snow S-2A crop dusters.

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Chad Veich
CWVeich Models
www.cwvmodels.com
Scale Model Design & Construction

I've got a few pictures from this event also; most of mine are actually from the pre-show media flights and the like on Friday, with just a couple from Saturday. I had a nice view out beyond the crowd; I was the drop zone safety officer for the WWII Airborne Demonstration Team. We were able to do a practice jump on Friday, but the gusts were a bit much (the dust devil that picked up the DZ panel and blew it a few hundred feet was interesting) for us to jump on Saturday.

























Regards,

Andy

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WWII Airborne Demonstration Team
www.WWIIADT.org

Malcolm Laing's Ki-51 Sonia replicas.

http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/K/i/Ki-51_Sonia.htm

Loosely based on the Fairchild PT series using the metalized fuselage frame (note the PT-26 cockpit fit-out with Cornell canopy) gear legs, tail feathers and other various bits from the PT's along with a Shakey Jake for power.

I don't know about Snows, but I do know you will find various Funk and Weatherly bits involved.

Hope that helps....

Steve

wow a Dove AND and An-2

what's the story behind those?

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Paul Filmer
skippyscage photography

I was about to ask about the weird Japanese replicas - I thought they were Yaks at first!

Nice to see a Bf108/Nord 1002, too.

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Cheers

Daz

It just looks wrong to have a bomb on a Kate, it should be a torpedo.

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If God had wanted man to fly behind a flat motor, Pratt Whitney would've built one.

It just looks wrong to have a decal in American on a supposedy Japanese plane. On further thought it doesn't look any worse than on an American plane....................bad!

DZ, when they landed the Kate gear up last year, that particular torpedo took quite a hit. It's intact but needs a lot of work before it flies agin. Sure kept the damage to airplane to a minimum, though !

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"You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass..."
Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto

The Dove has been sitting in the same spot for a few years now. They just mow the grass around it...

http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/photo/113548.html



Great pictures!

The Snow S-2's look a bit strange in Japanese markings.

The C-47 drop is great to see! I have not seen that at one of our local Big shows...

Small shows rule!

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Zane Adams
There I was at 20,000 ft, upside down and out of ammunition.
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Perhaps it's a good history lesson for any who might have thought the B5N only went to war with torpedoes.

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.