NAS China Lake located in Ridgecrest, CA just had its first air show in twenty years. The home squadrons, VX-9 Vampires and VX-31 Dust Devils, each had the various airframes from their squadrons on display including the F/A-18D Hornet, F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, EA-18G Growler, and AV-8B Harrier. All three variants of the F-35 Lightning II were on display as well. The RNLAF (Royal Netherlands Air Force) brought the F-35A, the RAF (Royal Air Force) brought the F-35B, and US Navy brought the F-35C. The remaining static displays were three NASA aircraft from Edwards AFB, a few warbirds, and a few more aircraft from the USAF and US Navy. There were also interesting displays of weapons and equipment that have been developed and tested at China Lake.

The US Army Special Operations Command Parachute Team, The Black Daggers, started the air show by jumping from the VX-31 SH-60 Seahawk. They performed their technical maneuvers during the National Anthem, with two members presenting the American Flag.

The Patrouille de France flight demonstration team is currently flying a North American tour in honor of the one hundredth anniversary of the United States entering World War I. They are the oldest flight demonstration team in the world with their first performance taking place in 1931. The team uses eight Dassault-Breguet/Dornier Alpha Jets with red, white and blue smoke generators. Their appearance here at Mather Field in Sacramento is the only show scheduled on the West Coast.

The schedule included two T-38 Talons from Beale AFB and the Airbus A400M Atlas transport from the French Air Force, with the Patrouille de France as the stars. The static aircraft included two C-130 Hercules, a UH-60 Blackhawk, a T-39 Sabreliner, and a World War II Yak. After the A400M finished its routine, it was also opened up to the public.

Rainbow Canyon is a canyon out in the Mojave Desert in the Death Valley National Park. It is adjacent to Panamint Valley, which is all part of the NAS China Lake range airspace. Rainbow Canyon is the last part of the Jedi Transition, a piece of the low level Sidewinder Route that is used to train pilots to do low level, terrain following maneuvers. Many of the surrounding valleys are also designated for low level flight and some are part of the China Lake testing ranges. Much of the airspace is military airspace and is jointly used by the Navy and Air Force for their various testing and training.

This year’s Fleetweek had some amazing weather across all practice and show days for the weekend, which is rather rare for San Francisco. There was no humidity in the air which meant that the F-22 Raptor produced only a minimum amount of vapor in its high G maneuvers.

The parade of ships took place on Friday which was led in by the San Francisco fireboat and included the USS San Diego LPD 22, USS Mobile Bay CG 53, USCGC Mellon WHEC 717, and HMCS Calgary FFH 335. The four ships were open for tours for the remainder of the weekend.

The USN Leapfrogs started the show with two separate jumps out of a C-130 Hercules. The first one included two jumpers that held the American Flag between them as the National Anthem played. On the second pass five jumpers leaped out of the C-130 and performed various precision skydiving maneuvers including a few stacked formations and two jumpers locked together while spiraling down toward the ground for a low level release.