With bright skies and a bit of teamwork, the 2015 Great State of Maine Air Show ended with organizers considering the event a success that will return in two years.
“We were very happy with how everything went this weekend,” Herb Gillen of the Air Show Network said Wednesday.
Gillen said the estimated crowd for the show was around 25,000 for the two-day event.
Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority Executive Director Steve Levesque said they will be meeting with the Air Show Network soon to “discuss lessons learned for a future 2017 show.”
Levesque said the decision to make the air show an every-other-year event was made in 2012. One reason for that, he said, is market saturation and competi- tion with other shows in New England.
“There is a lot going on in the region in the summer, and experience has shown that a yearly show typically draws fewer people,” Levesque said.
The Blue Angels are on a two-year planning cycle which could place them back in Brunswick if they choose, Levesque noted. The Navy’s air demonstration squad has greater resonance with those connected to the former
Brunswick Naval Air Station than other flight teams, he said.
According to Levesque, MRRA is pleased to have contracted the show out to a professional air show organizer.
“It allows MRRA to focus our limited personnel and financial resources on managing our facilities and promoting the redevelopment effort,” Levesque said.
The air show’s success came despite a call for a boycott over the fact that veterans, like everyone else, were being charged admission.
MRRA had offered to pay
for tickets for any veteran unable to afford entry.
Levesque said MRRA purchased 12 tickets from the Air Show Network at the request of veterans.
In addition to the Angels, the show also featured demonstrations by Air Force F-22 Raptor ultra-modern fighter jets, as well as aircraft dating back to the second world war.
A WWII-era bomber, a B- 25 Mitchell, lost a piston during a flight on Friday. Kerry Ward of the Disabled American Veterans Flight Team applauded the effort between the flight crew of the B-25 and the Blue Angels maintenance team for getting the bomber back in the air for a Sunday performance.
“There was a very nice guy who helps with the B-25 rather frequently who flew the parts up on Saturday,” Ward said.
“We performed just before the Blues and weren’t sure it would be fixed on time,” Ward said. “The Blue Angel mechanics were eager to help. They don’t spend a whole lot of time with warbirds and found it superinteresting.”
dmcintire@timesrecord.com
Show numbers
HERB GILLEN of the Air Show Network said the estimated crowd for the Brunswick show was around 25,000 for the two-day event.
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