Fast and Low

I have been posting a few shots of butterflies in recent days but for today I wanted to share some other flying machines.

I spent a very cold five hours standing on a hillside in Snowdonia recently in an area known as the Mach Loop where military pilots hone their skills as they practice low flying through the hills and narrow valleys.

Some days there are more fly throughs than others and on this particular day there was low cloud for much of the day which is not what you want. Having travelled quite a way I didn't want to give up too soon and so hung on long after most of the other guys who had been waiting at different spots on the hillside.

My nearest neighbour was just packing away his gear and I was about to do the same when he picked up some traffic on his scanner and radar app and he shouted up that some USAF f15 Eagles were heading into Wales and had requested permission for low flying.

After such a long wait excitement levels increased and hearing that the approaching planes had dropped off the radar meant they were flying low and would soon arrive.

In all four jets came through making two passes each. In all the flying display lasted for no more than 10 minutes but even that short time was enough to make up for the waiting around. It is so impressive to see these incredible machines blast past at high speed and full respect to the skill of the pilots.

By the time they arrived however light levels had fallen and so perhaps the images I captured weren't as sharp as I had hoped but hey, I can always go back another day.

Mach Loop

On Thursday I took my first trip to Cad West on the Mach Loop in North Wales.  This is an area used by military pilots for low flying training. It can be hit and miss whether you get to see anything but there were plenty of other hopeful photographers who had made the effort to make the steep climb to a good vantage point all looking down the valley in anticipation.

A regular visitor to this spot happily announced that earlier in the week there had been 20 or more passes through the valley and that 5 passes was a bad day.  So with expectations set high I settled down for what turned out to be a long wait.

It turned out that due to an accident in the valley and the air ambulance having to airlift the casualties to hospital low flying on Thursday was reduced.  

We did get three passes by Hawk Jets from RAF Valley and I was able to get a few half decent shots as you can see above.  

Although I was disappointed by the lack of action the fly pasts that I did see were incredible; the speed, the noise and the sheer skill of the pilots as they threaded through the narrow valley were captivating and I will definitely be going back for more.