surrounding severe weather in the region. What may have been negative for Puerto Rico, was to be great for Huntington Beach! Never before, in the entire history of the team, had the Red Arrows been this far west. Having three major, military jet teams in one show, was a first for us. Now billed as “One City, Three Jet Teams” the Great Pacific Air Show was going to be the stuff of legend before it even got started.

Since the performers obviously can’t take off and land on the beach, they stage the teams and Military aircraft at the nearby Joint Forces Training Base, Los Alamitos. We were there for the arrival of the Thunderbirds on Thursday. The Snowbirds and Red Arrows had already arrived and as you can see their aircraft were perfectly aligned awaiting their next flight. Civilian performers were based at Lyon Air Museum, at John Wayne Airport.

The show kicked off with a group of fire fighting helicopters and the national anthem, soon followed by the Red Arrows support aircraft, the A400M Atlas. The Navy Legacy Flight included a pair of F/A-18E Super Hornets flanking an F8F Bearcat in the markings of the Blue Angels. Next up was the massive C-17 Globemaster making its way gracefully down the beach, eventually being joined by a KC-135 Stratotanker in a mock refueling pass. Mike Wiskus performed aerobatics in his bright orange, Lucas Oil, Pitts S-1-11B over the water surrounded by the spray of a fireboat from below.

Then it was on to the first of our three teams, Canada’s Snowbirds. The Snowbirds fly a smooth graceful routine that includes nine aircraft in an orchestrated aerial ballet that is truly wonderful and a real crowd-pleaser.

After the Snowbirds, our attention turned to the beach where two men launched from the sand into the air on jet packs. Real jet packs, not water jets as many of us have seen in recent years. In what was billed as the first jet pack appearance at an air show, they seemed to fly effortlessly in a standing position out over the water, even dipping their feet in the sea at one point. It was like watching something from a comic book, now I really want a jet pack.