Gripen Michael Hind

6th April

  • 6th Apr 2023

Following on from last week's confirmation of the Spanish Harriers, you can imagine the excitement at Douglas Bader House when we received confirmation from Italy, that we will have another Harrier at this year's show! The Italian Navy will provide one of their AV-8B+ aircraft for static display at this summer's Air Tattoo, an extremely welcome appearance as this will be the first time we've seen them at RIAT since 2005!

We're pleased to welcome the Czech Air Force back to RIAT: In the air we'll be treated to a solo display from their JAS-39C Gripen, plus a tactical pairs display from their L-159 ALCA jets. In addition, we're also very pleased to be welcoming their Mi-171 Hip helicopter for static display. The plan is for aircraft '9868' to attend which has been painted in special colours to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the first flight of the Mi-8 helicopter and the 55th anniversary of the introduction of the first Mi- series helicopters into the service of the Czech Armed Forces. The aircraft's special colour scheme features different colour patterns to show how the camouflage scheme has changed on individual helicopter types over the last 5 decades.

Joining the HM Coastguard static display area at RIAT 2023 will be two fixed-wing SAR aircraft operated by 2Excel, in the form of their King Air and DA62 aircraft. This is planned to be the public debut of their new Diamond DA62 MPP in 2Excel service, adorned in red/white rescue livery.

An update regarding the participation of Patrulla Aguila at RIAT 2023; we have been informed by the team that this year they will be performing with 6 aircraft, so we have updated our participation list to reflect this.

We have been continuing discussions with a range of aircraft operators regarding the intent to bring aircraft to this year's Air Tattoo, with a number of exciting military and civilian participants on the horizon. In addition, we have been finalising arrangements for a significant number of civilian aircraft from Italy which will travel to Fairford for our ITAF100 celebrations, the first of which we will be announcing next Thursday!