Favorite Oshkosh Air show routine?

[jjhoneck]

John Mohr. What Patty or Bob of the others do is great, but in many cases it is a lot the airplane. John does his in a STOCK !!!!! 220 hp Stearman. It is 75% pilot and only 25% airplane. I have noticed some of the top acro pilots stopping to watch him in awe, as he goes down the flight line on knife edge at about 100 feet off the runway. Delmar was great too, and a nice guy. He took me for a ride in his Buecker one time at no charge. That is quite a plane!

John Mohr IS amazing.

The first time I saw him perform was in Galesburg, IL, at the National Stearman fly-in. The runway there has a high crown, with a deep drainage ditch along the far side that he used to HIDE IN on one of his runs.

He dove down -- and didn't come up as expected. From our vantage point, we all thought he had crashed! The crowd stood up and gasped as one, holding our collective breath -- only to see him zoom climb up straight into inverted flight.

Well, "zoom" is relative, of course. The Stearman has a pretty sedate zoom -- which makes the maneuver all the better, IMHO.

Great pilot.

[Mike M]

Duane Cole. 85hp. If you did not stand in awe, you never flew acro yourself. Plus, he flew to airshows VFR. How many did he get wx'd out? Awesome.

[flibmeister]

If you want to count just the first ten seconds, then it's Kirby Chambliss. I've been the air boss at several of his shows, and the reaction on the hot ramp is always the same-- when he applies the power for takeoff, all conversation stops, everybody stops whatever they're doing and watches. Once he pushes the nose over, it's back to whatever they were doing before.

For pure entertainment, I have a hard time picking between Bob Hoover (in the Shrike) and Jimmy Franklin in the jet Waco-- with Kyle riding the wing. Watching that jet-powered Waco was like watching an old Japanese sci-fi flick, poorly dubbed into English-- what you were seeing with your eyes, and what you were hearing with your ears, just didn't seem to compute.

[jbandstr]

Who was the guy who had the landing gear mounted on top of the plane so he could land inverted?

I remember thar airplane also and I wonder the same thing.

[Bill Greenwood]

Rick Hosking in the late 80s, but I am told that there was one long ago in Europe, perhaps part of a German circus act back in the 30s.

[JimRice85]

Red Devils.

[jbandstr]

I like Sean D. Tucker, but, in the past, I liked the Northern Lights Team.

[Tom Steber]

Having been going to airshow for over 40 years, I've seen many acts. Ed Mollor(?) back in the 70's, the Red Devils/Eagles aerobatic team, Bob Hoover, the French Connection, Jim Franklin. Then in the late 80's early 90's when guys like Wayne Handley, Sean Tucker and Jim LeRoy changed everything. Now there are so many really good pilots out there. Still John Mohr is one of the best. But, for sheer jaw dropping, laughing out loud, I can't believe their doing this factor, nothing has topped Masters of Disaster. Watching video of one of their shows will never do it justice. You really had to be sitting there. If you could stay seated.

[FlyingRon]

Really? I thought the masters of disaster was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen at an airshow.

[jjhoneck]

Really? I thought the masters of disaster was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen at an airshow.

I thought it was fun. It certainly brought some freshness to a moribund industry.

I've been watching airshows for 4+ decades now. I can count the number of fresh and truly innovative performers/routines on one hand.

1. Bob Hoover, Shrike Commander.
2. John Mohr, Stearman.
3. The Jet-powered Waco.
4. Matt Younkin, Twin Beech
5. Masters of Disaster.

All the rest are skillful and daring, but pretty much variations on a theme.