A LITTLE BIT OF EVERYTHING AT AIRVENTURE 2024

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Story and photos by Scott Jankowski

AirVenture, EAA, Oshkosh, whatever you chose to call it, it definitely has a little bit of everything and anything that the Aviation Enthusiast could ever look for or want to see. There is more to AirVenture than the Warbirds, Modern Military aircraft, Formation Jet Teams, special salutes and such, in this article we will take a look at some of the other types and classes of aircraft to be seen as well as some non-flying sights.

General Aviation aircraft always makes up a huge portion of the daily aircraft movements every year. EAA reported that a total of 16,780 aircraft operations occurred in the 11-day period from July 18th to July 28th, these included a mix of General Aviation and Business Props/Jets. One will also find all of the main General Aviation Aircraft Manufacturers present on the AirVenture Grounds with the majority being located on the main walkway from the parking areas to Boeing Plaza or show center. On any given day you will see many different types of aircraft including those manufactured by Beechcraft, Cessna, Pilatus and Piper.

A total of 1,200 Vintage or Classic Aircraft were present this year with 7/25 set as the day many of these Vintage Aircraft would fly in the afternoon airshow. One noteworthy Vintage Aircraft was a 1967 vintage Aermacchi Lockheed Turbo AL-60F-5 Trojan registered N96038. This school bus themed paint scheme features characters from the Sesame Street Television Show in the windows on the right side of the aircraft and characters from Charles Schulz’s Peanuts on the left side. In addition to this unique aircraft several examples of Bellanca, Beechcraft, Piper, and Waco types were also seen.

EAA also reported a total of 65 Seaplanes were in attendance this year and included several different types with quite a few examples manufactured by Grumman Aircraft.

Electric powered aircraft are becoming more popular and prevalent and included the brightly painted C-FIFQ, a De Havilland of Canada DHC-2 MK1 Beaver. This Beaver is operated by Harbour Air Limited based in Richmond British Columbia Canada. This “E” or electric Beaver is still being tested and evaluated and is expecting to be certified for passenger service in 2025.

Commercial passenger and cargo aircraft can be seen at AirVenture every year. Once again, this year the Yellow Ribbon Honor Flight organized a trip from AirVenture to Washington D.C. for Wisconsin Veterans to visit their memorials. This year saw 100 Vietnam Veterans flown to Washington D.C. onboard American Airlines A321-223 registered N167AN which wears the special Medal of Honor color scheme. This A321 named “Flagship Valor” features a livery that incorporates the three variations of the medal, 13 stars to represent the original 13 colonies of the United States, and light blue the symbolic color of valor. The 6 words under the windows exemplify Medal of Honor recipients and acts that made them elite: courage, sacrifice, integrity, commitment, patriotism, and citizenship. The silhouettes represent the 7 major conflicts since the Medal of Honor was created, including the Civil War, Vietnam and Afghanistan. American Airlines had this aircraft on display on 7-27, they day after it’s Honor Fight to Washington D.C and departed that evening.

Many regional and cargo airlines routinely use AirVenture as an opportunity to recruit new pilots, one such airline was Denver North Carolina based Mountain Air Cargo which operates as a Feeder Airline for FedEx. This year they had N990FX on display outside of their recruitment tent, a 2004 built Cessna 208B Cargomaster. Mountain Air Cargo has a fleet of 33 Caravans and flies 150 flights to 55 destinations on behalf of FedEx. N184BA, a 1962 vintage Beechcraft, was found up on the North side of the AirVenture grounds parked up at Warbirds and is owned and operated by Bemidji Aviation. The reason this Twin-Engine Beech was parked up at Warbirds is because it was originally built for the United States Army as a L-23F which would be used as a Utility Aircraft. The United States Army would redesignate the L-23’s to U-8F’s which is similar to the civilian version named the Beechcraft Queen Air. Bemidji Airlines would acquire the aircraft in 2013 and turned into a freighter running for UPS out of Minneapolis Minnesota.

As always AirVenture always attracts the top Airshow Performers our country has to offer. The year included performances by Kyle Franklin, Rob Holland, Skip Stewart, Vicki Benzing, and Scott “Scooter” Yoak.

One never knows what will show up around the AirVenture grounds, not everything has wings and can fly. One such example of this was the Fuselage of Elvis Presley’s Lockheed 1329 Jetstar now turned into an RV (Recreational Vehicle). The intact aircraft was bought at an auction for $234,000 and was located at the Roswell New Mexico Airport. The buyer, James “Jimmy” Webb soon determined that there was no way to restore the aircraft to make it flyable again and decided to retrofit the fuselage on top of an RV frame so he could drive it instead. James drove the Jetstar all the way from Florida to make its Oshkosh debut and stated it drives and handles very well and has a top speed of 70 miles per hour. Also seen around the grounds this year was “Otto” the inflatable Auto-Pilot from the 1980 movie Airplane! One never knows who or wait they will run into up at Oshkosh.

Oshkosh truly has something for everyone, no matter what type of Aviation Enthusiast you are chances are that you will find it here. If you have never been, you need to plan a visit at least once, you will not be sorry you did. Until next time, “Blue Skies to All!”

Scott Jankowski

Scott Jankowski - Franklin, Wisconsin Like so many others my love of aviation started when I was young, very young. I was only three years old when my Parents took me to my first air show here in Milwaukee, the rest you could say is “history”. I would read aviation magazines instead of Comic Books. I would prefer my Dad take me to the airport to watch airplanes instead of throwing a Football around. I grew up watching Convair 580’s, DC9’s and 727’s from the terminal here in Milwaukee, no Stage Three noise compliance back then! I started to seriously take pictures in the Mid 1980’s , for my birthday that year I finally had my first decent camera. I would head down to the airport with my pockets full of Kodak Film and take pictures of anything and everything. It did not matter if it was a Air Wisconsin Dash-7 or a 128TH ARW KC-135E if it had an engine I took a picture of it. I would drop those rolls off to be developed and three days later tear into the envelopes to see the results, which to be honest were not that good but there were a few keepers every once and a while. Fast forwarding to today with much better equipment and skills I spend as much time as I can at both General Mitchell International and Chicago O’Hare which are my Hometown Airports. While times and aircraft have changed the excitement is still as great as it was back all of those years ago. It makes no difference if it is 737, P-51, F-16, or Lear 35 I will not pass on any photo opportunity as you may not get that chance again. Even though my primary focus is on Commercial Aviation I still frequent as many Air shows as I can in the short Summer Season. I am fortunate enough to have EAA Air Venture in my backyard only being only an Hour and Half from my home. I routinely attend Air shows here in Milwaukee, Rockford, Chicago, Ypsilanti and the Quad Cities. I am very fortunate to be part of the Photorecon.Net and PHX Spotters Team and am looking forward to bringing everyone some Air show and Airliner action from the Midwest Region!

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