What's On?

Heart radio It's not just an air show! The Abingdon Air & Country Show will hopefully have, as well as a large scale fly-in of both modern & vintage aeroplanes and the associated air display - vintage vehicles; steam machinery; arena events, music and dancing; craft fayre, exhibits / displays, kids amusements to include a bouncy castle, climbing wall, mini quad bikes; tank rides, mobile farm, the return of the Daleks, RBS Williams Formula One Grand Prix Showcar, 1940s musical numbers from Fiona Harrison, the Heart Radio interactive studio and Alfresco Zone and much more!

Fiona Harrison Richard Holdsworth wil be there, signing his book 'Six spoons of sugar' - about evacuees in the war - he will be at the Air & Country Show tent. The Abingdon Town Mayor Mr Patrick Lonergan will be opening the show at 10am. We have always aimed to make our show a great family day out with lots to do and see for everybody - and it's all for charity, as we support the local Air Ambulance. The Thames Valley & Chiltern Air Ambulance, like all Air Ambulance services in the UK, is funded entirely by donations from the public and private companies. See the home page for the donation we gave in 2008.

Flying & Static Aircraft

Aircraft line-up The afternoon Flying Program will be approximately 3.5 hours long including military & civilian jets, helicopters, trainers & aerobatic types, with commentary from Sean Maffett.

As of 29th April the following display items are confirmed:

The Tigers Parachute team, Pembroke, DC-3 Dakota 'Drag em oot', P-40 Kittyhawk (tbc), P-51 Mustang, RAF Tutor, RAF Hawk, The Dukes of Cassutt, Swift Glider team, Nigel Wilson in his Yak-52, the Vampire Preservation Group's Vampire T.11 and Neil McCarthy in his Jet Provost T.3 (a public display debut for a regular Abingdon visitor!). We also hope to have one of the RAF Chinook displays this year.

All of the flying display aircraft (now including the Vampire) will be operating from the airfield. Unfortunately due to a landing accident the Hangar 11 Hurribomber will not be with us this year, and due to the training accident suffered by the RAF Tucano display pilot, we will not be having the Tucano display though we hope to get this year's freshly painted Tucano display ship to come along and be put on static display. All of us at Abingdon wish Flt Lt Mike Rutland a swift recovery.

C-17 The Fly In will be happening once again so weather permitting there should be lots of visiting aircraft - the static display will consist of the Fly In types and other types invited, consisting of civilian jets, helicopters and light aviation types, including ex RAF Bulldogs and Chipmunks, Harvard, RAF Merlin, Tiger Moths, Robinson R44, C172s, Fox Moth, Jet Provost T3, Alpi Pioneer, Army Historic Flight Alouette plus the based RAF 612 VGS Grob Vigilants. We will also have an RAF C-17 Globemaster III from 99 Squadron on static display - arriving and departing on the day of the show! Sadly the SHAPE UH-60A cannot now make it due to an operational mission being scheduled the day before the show.

Vintage & Classic Vehicles

Cars With vintage and classic vehicles of all types attending we hope to have a bumper selection in 2009 ranging from steam engines, classic cars, police cars (perhaps a police box - more familiar to the current generation as the model for Dr. Who's TARDIS!), buses, ex-military vehicles and much more!

Previous shows

For a better idea of just what happens at the Abingdon Air & Country Show, have a look at these reports for previous shows.

We hope you come and join us, have a great day out and make some money for the Air Ambulance! See you on the 3rd of May!