Mooney Diamond Formation over Cockburn Sound
One thing about voice messages is that when you get a few and they’ve bank up, it takes for ever to listen to them all, worse still, you have to go through them in order of when they were received. Having missed a call from BigKev, the message said it was number 12 in the list. It had to wait…
It was now Saturday morning and I had built the courage to tackle the now 15 voice messages. Finally at number 12, BigKev’s message “5 Mooneys, formation practice, wheels up at 4 Saturday arvo, front seat for you”. Now feeling slightly bad that my procrastination to check the messages meant I had not returned this or a number of calls already. Straight onto the phone to BigKev, the seat was confirmed. Although I’d heard the message wrong and it was instead Sunday arvo. Sweet!
Having flown my Non-Circuit practice flight earlier on the Sunday morning, I’d arrived at Jandakot a little early. The goal was to get some good photos today, so dusting off my Canon 70-200m IS-F 2.8 lens and the 40D. Standing outside I worked on getting a few practice shots in. BigKev brought along his sweet 7D with a wide lens.
By the time we had briefed, we were down to 4 planes. It was BigKev, Rohan, Andrew and Jake as the four pilots. The plan was to depart via Freo Golf Course, up the coast to City Beach, then out over the ocean for some 15 to 30 degree turns. BigKev was formation leader, the others in a diamond behind. We went through a number of turns before changing positions and leads. On the way in, we held back and snapped a few shots.
All round, great fun and once again thanks BigKev!
Mooney Formation - Echelon Left with Perth city in the background
Pilots view (BigKev) from Echelon Right
Strong concentration of Andrew Eldridge in VH-JXC
Rohan keeps VH-SJT nice and tight in #2
Jake keeps VH-DJU tight with his formation partner inbound to Jandakot
Mooney formation flight track (187.5km, avg speed 182.9 km/h max speed 258.7 km/h)
Plane Adventures 
Hey I saw you guys take off from Jandakot, you took off in two pairs hey?
I was standing on the top of RACWA watching the last mooney taxi at take off speed and rush through his run up! lol…
Nice pictures 🙂
Keep up the blog!
Hey Jason, Thanks for your comment. We did take off in two pairs. Seems you noticed our slightly uncoordinated taxing 🙂 The last plane came down from the Northern Apron and did most of his run-ups on the way down. Where are you at with your flying?
It was funny to watch 🙂
I have passed GFPT and flying for fun with Air australia for now 😀
Sweet, any plans to do your PPL? I’m slightly stalled at the moment trying to co-ordinate a new instructor who can do Nav #3 and sign me out solo if I’m up for it, frustrating!
I am just staying current until i start flying at singapore flying college later in november 🙂 So no plans to do any navs at air aus 🙂
Who was your instructor?
My instructor is Adam and he has been great. Unfortunately since he is grade 3, he can only take me to Nav #2. From here on it I need at least a grade 2. Good luck when you PPL training starts in Nov!
Damn shame, nice bloke Adam is 🙂
Cheers mate, keep up the good work on this blog!
Awesome photos! Very cool.