Blue Angels are ‘go,’ rain or shine

The Navy’s Blue Angels will fly rain or shine Saturday and Sunday for an expected 110,000 people, streaking through the sky at speeds as high as 700 mph and sometimes just 18 inches apart at Kaneohe Bay.

Visibility, on the other hand, will dictate what type of show the demonstration team puts on. Some rain is expected over the weekend.

Weather “is always a factor,” said Capt. Tom Frosch, the Blue Angels’ commander and flight leader in the No. 1 position. “We’ve got shows for different levels of weather. We have five different shows. So as long as we can see the ground and we have visibility and we can see where the mountains are — and with all that we can fly a safe demonstration — then we’ll fly.”

The F/A-18C pilots will fly as high as 9,000 feet if the skies are clear, Frosch said Thursday. If it’s a “low” show, “as long as we have up to 1,000 feet (altitude), it gives us some clearance below the weather and ensures that we can be above the crowd safely.”

But he also noted that “every show has something different to offer,” adding, “The lower shows, they have more focus on formation and getting close to the crowd, because we just are flying slower. We’re just demonstrating formation. The higher shows have more dynamic breakout maneuvers, so they all have something good to offer.”

The gates open at 9 a.m. Saturday and Sunday for the Kaneohe Bay Air Show, with planes in the air at 11 a.m., the base said. A dress rehearsal for military families will be held today. The Blue Angels are expected to fly midafternoon over the weekend.

Aerobatic and other demonstration flying will come from the Blue Angels’ Marine Corps C-130T, nicknamed “Fat Albert Airlines,” as well as Jacquie B, Hank Bruckner, Rob Holland, Alan Miller and Mike Wiskus. The Hawaii Air National Guard is sending an F-22 Raptor fighter.

Dan Buchanan will pilot a hang glider; the Navy’s “Leap Frogs” parachute team and Flying Leathernecks will drop in for landings; and a vintage Wildcat, Avenger and SNJ are on the appearance list.

Static displays are expected to include Marine Corps AH-1W Super Cobra and UH-1Y Huey Venom helicopters, a Coast Guard C-130 airplane and HH-65 Dolphin helicopter.

The Blue Angels performed at the old Barbers Point Naval Air Station in 1995, skipped Hawaii for nearly a decade and came back in 2004, flying out of Kaneohe Bay. The Koolaus have been a Blue Angels backdrop in 2007, 2010 and 2012, with a show at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in 2014.

“The military significance and history associated with Hawaii is so profound on so many different levels,” said Frosch, a combat pilot with 830 carrier landings. “So for us it’s not only a way for us to bring the military to all the corners of the United States (including) Hawaii and Alaska, whenever possible, but it’s also a way for us to kind of show our respect for this important part of our history, and we get crowds every time we come here. And we get different demographics. So for so many different reasons, it’s always great for us to come here.”

Petty Officer 2nd Class Yael Martinez, who works on air crew survival equipment for the Blue Angels, said the pilots don’t wear the G-suits that combat pilots usually wear to prevent blackouts in high-speed turns.

“Our pilots don’t use that, so they do a lot of practice, a lot of training (to counteract G-forces),” he said.

The reason they don’t wear G-suits is because the leg area of G-suits inflates to push blood into the upper body during maneuvers, he said. But Blue Angels pilots fly so close, they brace the control stick using their arm and leg to minimize movement, and an inflating and deflating G-suit would interfere with that precise control.

Martinez said he left his last assignment in Hawaii in March, applied for the Blue Angels and “I got very lucky to make it in, and I’m very happy to be back in Hawaii.”

The Marines will put on a demonstration of a Marine Air-Ground Task Force with a flyover by two big CH-53 helicopters and a Huey and Cobra gunship with simulated rocket fire and “wall of fire.”

The CH-53s will drop off Marines, who will simulate an assault; an artillery piece will be slingloaded in; and Marines will demonstrate a “special patrol” insertion using ropes, officials said.

Entry is free, and paid premium seating still is available.

More information is available at www.kaneohebayairshow.com.