Where else can you…
Be asked to be photographed by Chinese businessmen while they ask you (through and interpreter) where they can buy vintage aircraft for their for their Porsche dealership back home “Where pandas come from”?
Watch people happily stand in line to just look inside of an airliner?
Have a chance encounter with a photographer for the National Air and Space Museum?
Watch ultralight aircraft fly over your head into the sunset?
Chat in the evening with a New Zealand medical helicopter pilot who flew the first Ebola patient in New Zealand for treatment?
.. and all in one day?
The EAA’s AirVenture in Oshkosh, WI of course.

And let’s not forget the thousands of aircraft all all shapes, sizes, and colors to see as well.

Traffic Jam at Oshkosh
Traffic Jam at Oshkosh – photo by David Eckert, Air Museum Network

Along with the countless homebuilts, this year’s show also featured the Airbus A350, a tribute to Burt Rutan including a flyover featuring some of the aircraft he designed, some “new” warbirds and the USAFs latest fighters the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lighting II and q B-52 Stratofortress.

P-51C "Berlin Express"
New restoration P-51C “Berlin Express” – photo by David Eckert, Air Museum Network

Oh and the weather was nearly perfect.

Airshow!
Airshow! – photo by David Eckert, Air Museum Network

The Numbers

  • Approximately 550,000 people attended with a total attendance increase of approximately 2%.
  • More than 10,000 aircraft arrived at Wittman Regional Airport in Oshkosh and other airports in east-central Wisconsi including 1,031 homebuilt aircraft, 976 vintage airplanes, 350 warbirds, 130 ultralights and light-sport aircraft, 101 seaplanes, 30 rotorcraft, and 50 aerobatic aircraft.
    An all-time record of aircraft movements was established – 16,278 for the week – with some single-day arrivals alone exceeding 3,000.
Land in the green dot
“Land in the green dot.” Bringing em in at AirVenture 2015 – photo by David Eckert, the Air Museum Network
  • More than 500 volunteers kept things moving.
  • There were more than 800 commercial exhibitors, including more than 140 new exhibitors this year.
  • A total of 1,048 forum and workshop sessions were attended by more than 75,000 people.
  • There were nearly 600,000 AirVenture web sessions from around the globe; 40,000 downloads of the EAA AirVenture app; AirVenture social media posts reached 82 countries; and EAA’s 1,000 photo uploads were viewed nearly 8 million times.
  • 2,299 visitors registered at the International Visitors tent from a record 80 nations, with Canada (485 visitors), Australia (266), and Germany (204) comprising the top three represented nations. (Note: Actual international counts are higher, as these are self-reported figures collected at the International Visitors Tent alone.)
  • 970 media representatives were on-site, from five continents.
F-35 Lightning II
The F-35 Lightning II makes it air show debut at AirVenture 2015 – photo by David Eckert, the Air Museum Network

 

Next Year

Next year promises to be yet another great event with the following:
• Burt Rutan bringing his SkiGull
• Hoping that the B-29 Doc is flying and ready to come to Oshkosh
• The 30th anniversary of the RV-6 design, the most successful kit design ever, led by 4,000-hour RV-6A pilot Paul Rosales.
• Anniversary of the F-16
• Centennial year of Boeing

Click on thumbnail images  below to see larger view.

(See higher res and more images here: https://flic.kr/s/aHskh6SnGf)

[slickr-flickr tag=”Oshkosh 2015″ items=”48″ type=”gallery”]

Always a great show EAA’s AirVenture in Oshkosh

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