In 1996, an Alitalia B747-200 Jumbo Jet accompanied by two ItAF combat aircraft performed a remarkable display during Ostia Air Show.

Ostia, on the Tyrrhenian coast, few kilometers to the west of Rome, has hosted 13 editions of the Ostia then Rome International Air Show: the first one in 1988 and the last in 2014.

Located between an international airport (Rome-Fiumicino) airport and a military airfield (Pratica di Mare airbase), the air show has often attracted interesting aircraft, including large airliners and fast jets. As happened in 1996. On Jun. 2, 1996, the Ostia Air Show included a really unique display: an Alitalia B747-200 performed some flybys escorted by an Italian Air Force Tornado IDS and an AMX belonging to the 311° Gruppo of the Reparto Sperimentale Volo (ItAF’s Test Wing) from “Pratica”.

Unfortunately all I could find about that airshow (that I attended) are the three photographs (hence the poor quality) that you can find in this post. You can still get an idea of the sight (by the way if some of our readers have better photographs or a video, please let us know).

The somehow crappy photos taken from the beach by this author show the Alitalia Jumbo (a type that had already taken part, alone, to the 1991 edition of the airshow) flying alongside the Italian combat jets (noteworthy, the Tornado IDS was still wearing the Desert livery applied to the fleet that took part in Operation Locusta – the Italian contribution to Desert Storm in 1991 – from Al Dhafra, in UAE).

By the way, between 1970 and 2004, Alitalia operated a fleet of 21 B747s: 2x -100 and 19x -200 examples.

As already said, the airshow often featured airliners along with combat aircraft. Watch what this ATI MD-82 did in 1992 (I was there as well):

All photos: Author

 

I’ve already discussed the Eurofighter low passage in a dedicated post. Here are the pictures I took from both the small dock located to the left of the display area and from the top of the Plinius lido building, slightly right of the previous spot. I was initially cleared to take pictures from one of the organisation’s boats but there was slight sea and I had to stay “feet dry”.
Full collection of pictures taken on May 30 and 31 is available at the following address:
http://lowpassage.com/2009/06/01/rome-international-air-show-ostia-air-show-30-310509/

The following pictures represent a selection of all the images taken during the rehearsals of the Rome International Air Show.
Full collection of pictures taken on May 30 and 31 is available at the following address:
http://lowpassage.com/2009/06/01/rome-international-air-show-ostia-air-show-30-310509/

On May 30 and 31, 2009, I’ve attended the Rome International Air Show 2009, held at Ostia. I’ve shot many interesting pictures and I will publish them on this website in the next days. In the meanwhile I’ve uploaded just a couple of pictures of the most thrilling moment of the Air Show: the low level flyby and subsequent pull up with full afterburner of the Eurofighter Typhoon of the Aeronautica Militare (Italian Air Force, ItAF).
The facts: during the display of the F-2000, most probably because of the stong wind from South and bad weather conditions, the pilot of the RSV (Reparto Sperimentale Volo, Italian Test Wing), overflew the public at very low level with full afterburner.

Coming out of the first maneuver, the F-2000 began a left 180° turn to return towards the center of the display area but overshoot the display line and came over the beach with the undercarriage down overflying a small dock located to the left of the display area with full AB.

I was taking pictures from that small dock and saw the aircraft coming down towards the crowd that was standing below the dock’s pylon. The following pictures show the aircraft before and after the flyby from my point of view.

An interesting flyby with a happy ending, but many people was scared and almost deafened by the low passage.

The following interesting Youtube video shows the aircraft performing the low passage on the dock (you can see the dock on the right of the scene, marked by a pylon that is similar to a streetlamp). It just gives an idea of how low the aircraft was.