Beautiful weather, and a beautiful location for some formation flying last weekend. Santa Maria, California (KSMX). Inland enough that there were no worries about the marine layer coming in to delay the day’s flying. But close enough to the central California coast to allow some great photo ops.
Formation Flying at Santa Maria, Oct 2008
Fun weekend for the West Coast Hepcats, an informal group of pilots flying Grumman light single aircraft. Informal, but very serious about our formation flying. We take this very seriously (with strong focus on safety), following FFI and Grumman formation flying standards. This weekend our training included 2-ship and 4-ship formations (I’m flying slot in the above photo) and even a 6-ship formation with a Delta configuration. If you are interested in flying formation, PLEASE get the appropriate training. It is intense, safe, and fun when the participants are properly trained, led, briefed, and can execute (good stick-and-rudder skills).
Posted by brianflys 
