Sami Kontio Airshows

Back on track

2010-03-02T00:27:00.007+02:00

The 2009 season is long time ago behind and the preparation for 2010 are underway.
There will be some nice surprises (I hope ;-D ) and our schedule will be confirmed soon.
As it looks at the moment the season will be very interesting with different kind of events.
To that we will come back in a short while.

And yes, I'm not anymore on road to Slovenia...
Made some stops in Poland, Lithuania, Finland, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Czech, Austria, France, UK, Germany and Sweden in between last post and now. And I guess there was something more but who counts.

Now in Finland and as you can see we have snow and cold weather and there is no knowledge of the greenhouse effect.Thank you Mr K_ _ _ _ _ _ _ for pushing me to make the update :-D

On the road to Slovenia

2009-07-08T01:29:00.004+03:00

Only some 45 nm from the final destination Slovenj Gradec I had to stop due to wx.
There was no way that I was able to fly to the final destination in rain and clouds that where on the ground specially when you need to go around a mountain of 5600 feet...
So I stopped at Murska Sobota and waited for better wx which arrived the next morning.
During the whole ferryflight from Finland to Slovenia not even one leg was I able to stay dry. On each leg I was had to go through bad weather and rain, while at Balaton in Hungary just before Murska Sobota I was greeted with some thunderstorms and lightnings...
And yes also on the last leg from Murska Sobota to Slovenj Gradec there was some rains that I had to fly through if I wanted to get there...

Stop at EPKK

2009-07-08T01:18:00.003+03:00

When the plane had been shoot (by camera, not down) it was time to change scenery to Slovenia for a training camp.
Second landing at Krakow Poland showed that the world is sometimes small when a Piper from my homefield was found at the same apron.Then you can always ask who has the bigger plane I or LOT?

Photoshoot

2009-07-08T01:10:00.002+03:00

Since the plane got an facelift I needed to make a A2A session with my trusted photowizard Mikko Maliniemi.
Here are couple pics for you to see from the session.
And thanks to Viki Korjula for having a steady hand in the photoplane.

Recap from the last 4 weeks...

2009-06-23T00:25:00.008+03:00

Have not had time to keep you updated so here is a short recap of what has happend during the last month...
From Ampuriabrava the ferryflight continued to France and Dijon to meet some friends.Unfortunately I was able to witness a crash landing but happily only the plane got hurt.We had a party for Tonio who got he's "wings" in a Stampe and we enjoyed a nice barbeque and yes that's sausage (chirozo to my friends, it's a long story ;-D)
For those who follow jet team displays, they should find two Breitling jet team pilots in the pics.Then back home, no interesting pics from the trip through Germany and Sweden to Finland, sorry...
But we made a facelift on the plane before leaving to Jämi for a trainingcamp with Catherine Maunoury.
More to come soon...

3 are missing this time...

2009-05-28T22:57:00.004+03:00

Time to head back home.
In formation with Andy in Peters plane on our way from Madrid to Ampuriabrava.
The Spanish nature looks nice with it's green color at this time of the year BUT in september you can't recognize this to the same place when you fly at the same point...And a closer look at Peters plane.Yes, sometimes the weather is on your side when you make your ferryflight.

David and Goliath

2009-05-28T22:43:00.002+03:00

David is a man from Sweden and Goliath is a PBY Catalina from Spain (where Madrid is, correct ecki?).
Now after some years the Catalina will be put to flying condition and after an month or two the plane should be ready for the ferry trip to it's future homebase at Linkoping, Sweden.The hoses will be replaced (I saw one from January 1962) and midlife engines will be installed for the ferry flight while the new ones are waiting back home.
In my opinion planes like this should be flying so all the best for David, hopefully the weather favours along the French coastline on the trip home.

Madrid - in what country is it?

2009-05-28T22:39:00.005+03:00

As you can see ecki is giving us a speach where Madrid is placed.
For those who don't know or can't read maybe the picture helps you ;-D

1 is still missing

2009-05-20T00:26:00.001+03:00

from combat but she/he/it/that/something arrived today during the afternoon break.

Hamon Iberico II

2009-05-20T00:06:00.003+03:00

The sequals seems to be the name of the week.
And as in many cases we have seen before they are worse than the original...

But here is the proof that the Hamon Iberico actually was eaten. Patrick and Adilson was given the honorary work and they were up to it. Thank you guys!

Beauty and the beast

2009-05-18T00:22:00.002+03:00

and some sighting devices that stayed intact during the travel.And not to mislead anybody, here is the beauty and the beast!But they seem to follow the leader nicely :-D

Hamon Iberico

2009-05-18T00:20:00.003+03:00

Yes, this is what we need to live on for the next week. No other food is available ;-D
The dish or "roadkill" is presented by Ecki and the other eaters are Adilson and Peter.

Time before the device story...

2009-05-18T00:01:00.005+03:00

During my ride to the airport I heard from the news some "nice" information, the safety check personnel had walked out of the airport as protest. So now with the foremen running the safety check there where lines waiting at the airport. The feeling wasn't to great by the time I came to the airport. Fortunately I had an electronic ticket so I headed directly to the baggage drop.
Here is a view from the safety check line, still have an hour and 15 minutes until the flight departs... And the entry was not through door 3 or 2 but number 1 which hides somewhere behind the white bus!Long story short, managed to get on the flight 10 minutes before the pushback was started, belive that there was only 5 persons who managed to get on the plane after me.

Homework before leaving to Madrid

2009-05-14T23:15:00.008+03:00

Yes that's what I have to do. I'm going to Madrid and checked how I would get my sighting devices with me. Well the kind people at the baggage drop put me forward to the security check who kindly asked me to go to the ticket office since they see airplane parts made from carbonfiber as weapons. Yes you read that right, weapons...

So at the ticket office they looked at the sighting devices and told me that they will fit nicely (after some phone calls) in the cargo. But as all aerobatic pilots know that these are precision devices that will be crushed if they are wrapped only in plastic or cardboard and put in the same space as the baggage. There was only one solution left.
To build a sighting devices box!So here the box is after some cutting and screwing (not in the good old fashion way). Tomorrow I'll know how good my box came out, keeping my fingers crossed.

Back to school

2009-05-06T22:51:00.003+03:00

Well that was not my first thought when I graduated with my degree as a bachelor of science in engineering (many many years ago). But for some reason I sit on the bench with a small grin on my face. Maybe it's the subject that we focus on, the aerodynamical design factors of an airplane.

Even if you don't need to build your own plane, since we can buy them factorybuilt, it's always good to know some basic stuff of the theory side so you know what influences what. But I'll not bore you more with this stuff.

Evening activities

2009-05-04T00:38:00.006+03:00

When you fly and teach inside the plane in the morning you can take it easy and stay on the ground in the evening...
So the "plane" that needed some help was my old warbird, the Ultimate. It's still an awesome plane to look at. Too many hours put into the rebuild that I could say anything else. Yes, for you nitpickers I know there are some details that can be made better. Offtopic, I think that these pictures will be one of last one's with my name on the plane.But away Sami (Nikulainen) goes, that plane is just so impressive with two wings and everything. It doesn't leave you cold, specially when you play chicken with a car...And two happy Samis after the flight. The sighting device got it's "annual check" and it was OK. The same happend to the vertical roll that we had worked on last season, everything was good on that department too. So now it's time for more pratice and for me to get offline for a while. More to come later...

Morning activities

2009-05-03T23:59:00.008+03:00

We meet again with Mikko in the Extra 300 office at EFHF to see how he has progressed with the training.Time to taxi out infront of Malmi tower to holdingpoint 18.Just going south outbound Nokka reporting point towards our designated training area D20.Mikko on the vertical with a slip over the sea. We got that worked out. And I can tell you that an old dog can learn new things and with an remarkable speed! It's always rewarding to work with people who listen what you have to say, they don't let their ego come in the way and work hard and passionately. And with Mikko you can add his athletic youth in the combination and you have an person who wants to progress and he is truly much younger than he's age lets you belive. There are far too many young pilots I know who are much older than Mikko by their state of mind. After our workout it was time to head back to Malmi. Here you can see our practice "lines" at the Finnish coastline, lots of small islands to aim at or to get confused by.Yes, it was a nice way to start the day.

Back at EFHF for basic stuff

2009-05-01T19:20:00.005+03:00

Spain is left behind and I'm back on home turf. Blue skies are waiting and this is visible at EFHF airport as the planes are being pushed out of the hangars with ever increasing speed.

And since my plane is faithfully waiting for me in Spain I took the opportunity to help some local pilots with their flying. The tool was an Extra 300 and while Mikko Teerilahti wanted to get some basic stuff put together Tapio Pitkänen asked me to learn him some tumbles and gyroscopic maneuvers.Both took the lessons well and seemed to get the hang off it but I'll know the next time I see them fly how fast or slow they learn new issues.

They both have still some way to go to master the maneuvers we practised but they will eventually get it sorted out. How fast or slow that remains to be seen.
Anyway, I enjoyed it and at the same time it was an excellent way to start to enjoy the Labor Day.

Picture by Juha Klemettinen

Part III, from the untold story

2009-04-29T21:49:00.009+03:00

Next in the program was to pick up Markku Roscier from ALMT who would do the annual check.
For some reason I didn't understand mikko's concern when I took pics of Madrid city and us while driving... haven't you heard about multitasking! After looking at some more pics in the camera I have to come to a conclusion that he had to see something really interesting or disturbing on the sidewalk (short skirts?)

I couldn't find anything...
But it wastime to get back to the airport and to the annual check. Markku seemed to be happy with the papers and the plane. Like one supposed too when the papers and planepart numbers go together. So one's again we need to do a test flight to confirm that everything is running smoothly as it should before going back home. With a smile like that you know that everything is running OK, ain't life good!
Time to put the plane inside the hangar, clean up (Yes, Jesus also the 8JX as you asked) and fly back home so that I can return soon.

Part II

2009-04-29T21:27:00.005+03:00

Work time. Mikko seems to be happy working on the plane or that what he's supposed to do instead of posing to the camera ;-D

Well the annual took its time to complete but I don't mind since we got it made and I got to check my office. Note to myself, mikko didn't leave any tools in the plane so he goes to the better category of mechanics!
Business time, this is why we wake up in the morning. And when you report that everything is OK, what happens is that the mechanic takes your seat and wants to do his own checks. Well I guess we have to let them do that so they stay happy.

Busy week behind, part I

2009-04-28T23:59:00.009+03:00

But before the story I have to show you an "healthy meal" that was ordered by my friends in Abu Dhabi Mall. You eat one of those per day and soon your pump stops to tick... Next to it is a Nokia E90 phone which is a miniature brick so NO photoshop has been used on this pic!!

After coming home to the still cold Helsinki on Monday last week I had two days time to arrange some running stuff before going back to the sun.
So back on the plane, this time with Mikko Lahti from Joenservice maintenance company to take care of the annual maintenance on my plane.

But before we got to Madrid we decided to have a coffee break in Brussels. And what else do you bump into than the Red Bull Airrace...
But it's time to continue towards Madrid...

And 20 minutes after the picture above we have landed and it's dark but warm outside.

Part II of the story will be posted within 24 hours...

Race day

2009-04-18T18:57:00.002+03:00

Well hats off for Matt Hall. I don't think anyone could expect a result like that, 5th place. Matthias came in on 11th place while Yoshi was 13th and Pete 15th after hitting the Air Gate and pulling out of the track. Until then it was a truly solid flight and in my eyes would have been good enough to take Pete to the next round.
Well time to finish off in Abu Dhabi, something new will follow up soon, since we got the ball rolling...

Weather in Abu Dhabi

2009-04-18T18:56:00.001+03:00

Weather someone is asking. +45 C degrees is announced today during the race and you can feel the heat now when we have a calm day. This is good since every competitor has an equal racetrack.

So, destination unknown is Abu Dhabi

2009-04-16T17:08:00.004+03:00

Nice weather (seems to be an favourite topic...) what else can you say.Came to Abu Dhabi for the Red Bull Airrace to meet my friends. Matt, Matthias, Pete and Yoshi are competing for the first time at an Red Bull Airrace and there would not be a way that I would miss this moment to see them for the first time at the race track.

Managed to capture Mike Goulian in the quadro, the others where too fast (sorry Mike). You could see the difference in the planes (which are not equal) and in the lines they where flying to get a good time.

Tomorrow is the qualification and it will be nice to see how it goes for the guys. Keeping my fingers crossed for the rookies!

Destination Unknown...

2009-04-16T10:25:00.003+03:00

As promised here are some plane pics to destination unknown. The start looked like this with some nice weather.

After some 20 minutes into the flight we where treated with a nice Finnish coastline and some incoming cloudbase.

The final destination (unknown) is shown below and notice that the pic isn't out of focus, shaken or stirred ;-D
The plane just moved so fast that the camera wasn't able to follow :-D
Yes, there will be more info about the destination.

Spring is coming to Finland

2009-04-14T21:32:00.006+03:00

Yes, the weather seems to improve alot. Now +4 degrees C but still with some cold northerly winds. The runway has opened up at EFHV but there is no taxiway that could be used due to the remaining snow banks... Hope to provide to you soon some warmer pics including airplanes too ;-D

Ilmailu Maailma trailer

2009-03-31T22:23:00.000+03:00

Time to bring you some Ilmailu Maailma TV-series info that will be shown on the Finnish TV channel Nelonen during the spring.
The series will include 5 programs that will show the world of aviation in different perspectives.
And yes that's me during those first seconds...

It was time to do it!!

2009-03-31T20:57:00.001+03:00

Welcome and finally, I guess that's what you're supposed to say at this point...

Anyway, this is our way to keep you better updated on what's going on in the world of Sami Kontio Airshows! So stay tuned and enjoy the ride of an fascinating summer that's coming up!