2010 European Airshows

Making a most welcome return to the RIAT 2010 flying and static display was the AH-64D Apache from the Royal Netherlands Air Force (RNLAF). After their spectacular routine at the 2005 show, the RNLAF Apache display is back on the European airshow circuit with a total of six shows planned for 2010, and preparations are already underway for the 2011 season. The aircraft, from 301 Apache Squadron Defense Helicopter Command based at Gilze-Rijen Air Base, is flown by Major Raymond ‘Casper’ Laporte, with his co-pilot Captain Roland ‘Wally’ Blankenspoor. Major Laporte is one of the most experienced RNLAF pilots and is current Substitute Chief of the Test Flight Office at the home of the Apache in the Netherlands.

For the 2011 season, the demonstration should finally leave the command of the Test Flight Office and move to the responsibility of the Apache squadron itself, a process which has taken a little longer than expected due to operational requirements as Major Laporte explains:

“In 2002 the Apache solo display was started by two experimental test pilots from the Netherlands Air Force who were taught the manoeuvres by pilots from Boeing’s own test team, and, from 2002 to 2004, it was they who flew the routine. In 2005 there was a desire to transfer the demo from the Test Flight Office to the regular 301 flying squadron. I wasn’t an experimental test pilot back then but they took me in the front seat and we flew that season together, including here at Fairford, Le Bourget and other shows. The idea was that the next year, 2006, I would transfer to the back seat and a new guy from the squadron would come in the front seat, and that way it was out of the flight test office.

”But, because all the deployments started back then - in 2004 we went to Iraq and Afghanistan - we had a lot of aircraft on deployment and a lot of people training for those deployments, so we were really busy and made the tough decision to cancel the display at that time. But now we’re finishing the deployment in Afghanistan and there were sufficient flight hours available again to start up the show. Back home at our air base we’ve been celebrating its 100th anniversary, so it was a good time to start displaying again.

“We are not a dedicated full time display team, obviously, and besides what we’re doing here we are still doing our regular jobs throughout the week. Wally is an instructor pilot and I am an experimental test pilot. My work at the flight test office concerns projects like biofuels, introducing new radios, new systems on the aircraft and new versions of the Apache software.”

Capt Blankenspoor explains the work undertaken to get the Dutch Apache display back in front of the public. “We had one training week in October 2009. That was to convert Raymond from the front seat to the back and for me to be the next front seater. We did two more weeks of training, one in March and one at the end of April, and besides that, another 20 hours in the simulator.”

As with UK display acts the team had to gain a licence to display in front of the public, in the case of the Dutch Air Force this was awarded by the Director of Flight Operations.

The team played its part in providing one of the photographic highlights of the airshow season so far when spectators at RIAT 2010 were able to see the Apache flying in formation with its compatriot from the RNLAF, the solo F-16AM Fighting Falcon.

Major Laporte explains the origins of the formation. “We first did it in 2005 when we had three display teams. We had the Pilatus PC-7 - the training aircraft solo display - our Apache solo display and the F-16. It was suggested that we perform a flypast with all the three aircraft together, and a lot of people liked it! This year the PC-7 isn’t performing at shows (maybe next year – he adds) and so we decided that as it went down well back then that we would do it again this year. We did it at our Air Force open days and we said if we were together in a slot behind one another at Fairford we could do it here as well.”

As Major Laporte previously mentioned, the aviation press has shown a great interest in the experimental use of biofuel to power the AH-64D. This kind of developmental work is exactly the sort of thing the Test Flight Office at Gilze-Rijen is involved in.

“We used it back home at the Air Force open day. Two days before that we had a press gathering and it was the first helicopter flight on that kind of biofuel in the world, so it was quite special. There’s no change in performance, you don’t notice as a pilot that you’re flying on biofuel. This was more a technology demonstration to show that the aircraft and the engines are capable. The company producing the biofuel are trying to get it certified as jet fuel made from algae.”

The Apache display this year was prevented from the dramatic flare firing sequence which illuminated the 2005 show, but what the Fairford audience witnessed was more than impressive. Was there anything about the display which the pilots particularly enjoyed?

Major Laporte says, “The looping and rolling manoeuvres we normally don’t do so they are really special; being upside down in a helicopter! I think the most spectacular, and Roland agrees, is the vertical roll going down at 12,000 feet per minute, close to the ground and spinning out. It looks really cool from the cockpit!

“The good thing about the fly-by is that we normally go directly into the show, so we don’t get much time to look out of the window and see the crowd. It’s amazing to see how many people are here watching; it’s incredible!”

The team certainly seems to have enjoyed coming back to Fairford this year and there can be little doubt that the thousands who flocked to RIAT enjoyed seeing them - hopefully they can return again and perform at next year’s show as seeing the Apache’s incredible performance is always a highlight, especially with our own Army Blue Eagles taking a sabbatical and with no guarantee they’ll return in 2011.