Coventry-Baginton - 14/12/2008

The winter of 2008 has seen a number of organisations realise that there's a niche in the market for running night photoshoots.

The first one of these that I've been able to get to was held at Coventry-Baginton airport, by Air Atlantique Classic Flight.

I'll be honest and say that upon arrival I was slightly concerned that there wasn't enough space for photographers plus tripods to shoot everything, but as the evening progressed my concerns vanished, with everyone present very conscious of the other attendees, taking what they wanted before moving back to allow someone else in. In actual fact, it worked really well.

The original intention had been to run the Venom at the start and at the close of the event, but gremlins had found their way into the system and she really didn't want to open proceedings, so it fell to the immaculate DC-6 G-APSA to do so.

By now the Venom's stage fright had subsided and she did consent to play ball, however, this was the one run that I was unable to get into a position to shoot.

Next up was the strikingly schemed DC-3, G-ANAF. The large dome on the front houses equipment used during the development of various pieces of radar.

A tandem run next saw the two Dragon Rapides run together.

The Pembroke was slightly difficult to shoot from where I was, so I just have this to show from it.

While we'd been shooting the other stuff on the ramp, a black Chipmunk had arrived. The pilot later proceeded to taxi it around the ramp for a while. Of note were the gases shooting out of the exhaust.

Finally, closing the show was the Venom again. Unlike the first run where the 'boiler' had glowed red and spat out fire for some time, it was much more short-lived on this occasion. It still looked great with the smoke billowing out of the top though!

And that was that. A really good few hours and well worth the £20 admission. Hopefully this won't be the last of such events, and maybe some different aircraft can be run for them. Fair play to all at Classic Flight for putting on a great little event.