Thunderbirds

Mirrored

The finale and highlight of ShawFest 2010 was the Thunderbirds' performance. I had hoped to get some nice photographs of them, but was thrilled with some of the ones I actually managed to capture. The photograph above is one of my favorites with the two soloists performing a close pass. I love how the vertical stabilizers are matched together in the shot.

Follow the jump for another shot of these two planes.


Really Close

Now that is close! The aft fins near the rear of the engines look like they are actually staggered together. In other words, they are closer together than the planes would measure vertically. Like I said, it is Close!

Also, look very closely at both planes. They are number 5 and 6. Click the links below the photographs for larger images if you need to. The numbers are painted near the front of the engine intakes. Notice something odd about them? The number 5 plane is the inverted plane in each photograph. See anything odd about his number now? His number is right-side up in each photograph, yet his plane is inverted. He is the lead soloist and inverted in most of his passes past the viewing area. Thus, his number is painted upside down on his plane so that the number is right-side up when he makes one of his many inverted pass in front of the spectators. I thought it was kind of neat when I saw that the first time in these pictures.

Keep shooting.