7/1/12: Boston-Portsmouth Air Show and My Flight With the U.S. Army Golden Knights

I had the pleasure of attending the Boston-Portsmouth Air Show yesterday and had a wonderful time with my family.  It was my kids first Air Show so it was a huge thrill for them!  Plus I got the thrill of a lifetime.  I got to ride with the U.S. Army Golden Knights during the show!

This is a sampling of pictures but at the end of this post is a slidehow of all pictures I took.  Also in this post I have video of the entire flight including ground coverage and coverage on the plane that is really cool.  Here are the Blue Angels, more pictures later.  The view of them from the Media Area was phenomenal.

So awesome.

They also catered to the kids by having space and aeronatical bounce houses.

Kre-O Battleship Toys were represented.  I had seen them introduced by Hasbro at Toy Fair.

Now on to the fun part!  This is the plane I got to travel up in during the show.  This was one of the most amazing things I have done in my life.

Here I am with the plane ready for my briefing!

Here you can see the U.S. Army Golden Knights getting their parachutes ready.

On the plane.  I have to admit, despite my Aerospace Engineering background I was nervous.  I have never flown on a plane right next to a huge open door!

The guys getting ready!  You can see a small red canister around their ankle.  This is to provide a red cloud as they are parachuting so you can see them. 

The crew and the Golden Knights were all awesome to work with and were so nice to us.  They kept sitting next to me and asking me how I was doing and why I had never jumped out of a plane.  Maybe someday.

The view of the Air Show from the plane. 

Checking out where is the right spot to jump.  This took quite a while for them to decide.  They needed to guage the winds and use something that looked like a streamer to determine where the drop point should be to land on their target.  Talking to my husband after they hit their target perfectly.

And the 1st one jumps!  If you watch the video you will see him coming down.  It is so fast!

The rest of the guys ready to jump! 
The cool thing is there was one guy that jumped with them that had a helmet that had a camera and video camera.  He would use his tongue to take pictures as they were falling.

Here is the video which is awesome to watch as it covers inside the plane and out.



Here I am with the Pilot and crew.

This is a picture of the plane up in the air.

Here is Michael Goulian.  He is a former U.S. aerobatic champion from North Andover, Massachusetts, a competitor in the Red Bull Air Race World Championship and a recipient of the prestigious Art Scholl and Bill Barber Awards for air show showmanship Goulian was recently awarded the 2011 International Council of Air Shows (ICAS) Sword of Excellence, a prestigious recognition awarded to an individual based on contributions made to the air show industry.

When I was getting driven back across the runway I got a good view of the Blue Angels.

Crew of the Blue Angels getting ready.

Blue Angels during the show.  Awesome!

Here they are again.

The kids checking out the planes.

Evan in the Black Hawk.

Here it is from the outside.

Lauren in the Black Hawk.

Evan wih my media pass.

What an awesome show!

One more shot of the Blue Angels.

If you would like to see all Pictures you can check them out here on Shutterfly.

Click here to view these pictures larger

Disclosure: I was provided a Media Pass to the show and was treated to a ride with the U.S. Army Golden Knights.  No other compensation was received and all opinions are my own.