Kilkrazy wrote:
It will be great to see the world's second best aerobatic team back in action.

 djones520 wrote:
Huh... I just realized we didn't have our airshow this year. That slipped by quietly. That's a shame, my oldest really enjoyed it last year, I would have liked to have taken him again.

 Hedgehog wrote:
Most incredible of all are The Blades.

 Seaward wrote:

 Hedgehog wrote:
Most incredible of all are The Blades.

Huh. They use an odd cadence.

 Hedgehog wrote:
Strictly non-technical spectator here

Care to expand? Do you mean their timings?

 Seaward wrote:

 Hedgehog wrote:
Strictly non-technical spectator here

Care to expand? Do you mean their timings?

The radio calls. They're said the same (usually really idiosyncratic) way every time. A lot of the Blue Angels' sounds very sing-songy. It's hard to explain, but it's a little like the music that accompanies the dance, I guess. You know where you're supposed to be at any given note.

In normal (i.e., non-aerobatic) formation flying, you're basically just keeping whoever you're visually keying off of in the same spot relative to you, so you don't normally do verbal instructions, it's just staring at the other jet. Like driving down the highway and keeping the guy in the next lane dead even - you just stare over and adjust based on his relative position. Flying as close as flight demonstration teams do, you're doing the same thing, but you're also all synchronized by the lead's voice, so everybody's drawing back power or pulling the stick or whatever at the same time, without the lag of them starting to drift closer/away/ahead/astern before you begin to correct.

 Hedgehog wrote:
They're all ex-Red Arrows, I'd guess they're using the same system?

 Seaward wrote:

 Hedgehog wrote:
They're all ex-Red Arrows, I'd guess they're using the same system?

They might very well be. Never heard the Red Arrows.