The Hindu : Sukhoi to perform aerobatics in capital

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Dec 02, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Kerala-Thiruvananthapuram

Sukhoi to perform aerobatics in capital

By Our Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM Dec. 1. The most prestigious aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF), the Sukhoi-30 will be performing aerobatics in Thiruvananathapuram in connection with the Air Show being organised by the Southern Air Command on December 7 and 8.

The aircraft will take off from Pune, perform the exercise over the Shankhumugham beach and land back at Pune on both the days, informed Air Marshal T.M.Asthana, Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Southern Air Command.

The people of Kerala will be exposed to a totally new experience during the Air Show, he told media persons here today.

It will be for the first time that they get to see performance of the Sukhoi, the modern multipurpose aircraft, he added.

With this unique performance the IAF will be demonstrating its strategic reach wherein an aircraft can take off from the Western sector, complete its task in the Southern sector and return to where it took off from, all in the matter of a few hours.

Such an exercise will reassure the people of the Southern State that they are completely safe under the care of the sentinels of the skies.

The Air Show will be inaugurated by the State Governor Sikandar Bakht on December 7 and by Marthanda Varma Maharaja, the Head of the Travancore Royal family on the second day. The show will commence with the unfurling of the National Flag while the Mi-8 helicopters will be trooping the colours of the Indian Air Force, besides showering flower petals. Another breath-taking event will be the sky diving demonstration by six members of the `Air Devil' team who will plunge down from an AN-32 transport aircraft, from a height of 12,000 feet.

They will fly their body without any mechanical device from 12,000 feet to 3000 feet, in a free fall before they open up their parachutes to land safely.

The Air Marshal said that after the five-minute long- aerobatics by Sukhoi-30, the Surya Kiran aircrafts, numbering six, would perform marvelous manoeuvres in the sky.

They will demonstrate the pattern of `shock waves', Y- shaped yankee, diamond, geoblit, wineglass, T-shaped Tango, the phoenix and cards of three aircrafts each, in two straight horizontal arrangements.

The most sensational event will be two aircrafts advancing in a collision course, creating in the audience the fear of the worst kind.

However, they will swerve and fly past each other at the last moment, leaving behind a trail of fumes— green, white and saffron, painting the sky with the Indian tri-colour.

Air Commodore A.K.Bhardwaj, Senior Officer in- charge, Administration, said that a static display of the aircrafts of the IAF would also be organised to enable the general public to see them from the vicinity.

Besides, a fare has been arranged in the Air Force area at Shankhumugham to provide a festive atmosphere to the event.

Air Marshal Asthana said that the aim of the show is to project the image of the Defence forces in general and the Indian Air Force in particular, amongst the public of Kerala and also to motivate the younger generation to join the Defence services and be part of the IAF.

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Sukhoi to perform aerobatics in capital