Taken from 300 feet above the flight path of the RAAF C-17 Globemaster III airlifter doing the Riverfire Festival practice run.
Yesterday we posted some really amazing shots of the Royal Australian Air Force C-17 Globemaster III that flew a practice run for the annual Riverfire Festival along the Brisbane River and through the central business district on Sept. 23, 2021.
As “Stallion 63” flew at 300ft AGL over Brisbane, someone, situated above the flight path was also filming the airlifter as it maneuvered at low level rehearsing the Riverfire run due to take place on Saturday Sept. 25.
“We were situated 300ft above the C-17’s flight path, on the 51st floor of the Riparian Plaza,” The Aviation Studio’s photographer and writer Emil Cooper told us in an email. “The RAAF performed a fantastic demonstration of the Globemasters’ handling capability, they sure know how to throw it around! Riverfire offers an extremely unique perspective and opportunity with no other displays in the world offering this sort of low level flying through a metropolitan area well below building height.”
Indeed, the video and shots taken from that place speak for themselves: it seems like you are observing a low level pass through the Mach Loop or the Star Wars Canyon with the only difference that, instead of green fields, remote villages or desert, there’s a 2.5M city’s skyline with plenty of buildings! Outstanding.
The clip, in particular, gives an idea of the maneuverability of the C-17 that, in spite of its size, is able to perform pretty fast rolls (something that is not only good for airshows or flyovers, but can be particularly useful when trying to egress a SAM engagement zone or to avoid detection and interception from fast movers).
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Interestingly, the afternoon display consisted of two Australian Army ARH Tigers and two MRH90 Taipans, making their first appearance at the show since 2017. Emil was able to catch some really interesting shots of these too.
Thank you very much to Emil Cooper for sending us all the photos you can find in this article. Make sure you follow The Aviation Studio on Facebook and Instagram too.
