Saturday’s turnout was huge. With 80 pilots registered by the close of registration on Friday, Saturday’s registration grew the total to over 130 pilots. This has to be one of – if not the largest event on the east coast. There were over 150 spectators, 27 RV’s and campers and a double row of cars lining the back of the field from one end to the other.
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Some highlights on Saturday included the noontime demos, the Curtis Youngblood Auto Rotation Clinic, a full-scale Hughes 500 fly over and simulated auto, a Dueling flight between an airplane flown by Nick Maxwell and a Heli flown by Curtis Youngblood, an evening Question and Answer Session where all of the pros in attendance were on hand to field questions by general pilots and spectators, a Heli Clinic put on by Bert Kammerer, and the grand finale u-neak DESIGNS/Hobby Hangar “Do It in the Dark” Night Fly Competition.
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I found the Auto Rotation Clinic with Curtis Youngblood very interesting to watch with the crowd participation. Curtis would discuss what was basically happening during a basic auto and then he would perform an auto to show the crowd an example. He did many different types of autos in varying difficulty levels and towards the end of the clinic he was basically taking requests from the crowd as to what type of auto he would do next and then he would describe in detail what he was doing while he was flying the heli.
There were many prizes that were raffled off at the end of the day and the raffle table was packed with more than $5,500.00 worth of prizes donated by a bunch of great vendors.
-Align T-Rex 700 Limited Edition – HeliWholesaler
-Hirobo SDX 50 – MRC/Hirobo
-JR x9303 Transmitter – Hobby Hangar
-Outrage Velocity 50 – Outrage R/C
-JR x9303 Radio – Heli Invasion
-Outrage G5 – HeliDirect
-Minauture Aircraft Furion 450 – RC Hobbies & More
-Align T-Rex 450 Super Pro – Hobby Hut
-Futaba 520 Gyro – ReadyHeli
-Mavrikk 600mm Blades – HeliProz
-Misc. Tools & Accessories – HeliProz
-Misc Tail Blade & Paddles – KBDD
The u-neak DESIGNS/Hobby Hangar “Do It in the Dark” Night Fly Competition was a fun-filled event with a gaggle of spectacular crashes with the two noteworthy ones being Curtis’s heli flying full speed into a tree and Jared’s heli disappearing full speed into the corn field. This setup for a host of people continuing the contest flying unfamilair OPM’s. All in all the competition was longer than expected but exciting nonetheless. Nobody seemed to care and the crowd stayed for the entire event. The ultimate honors went to Bert Kammerer who walked away with a worn out O.S. 55 and a $500.00 cash prize.
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If you haven’t been to this event or heard of it, you should definitely mark it on your calenders for next year. This is an event that Joe Coppela described as a “Mini IRCHA” and it is exactly that.
Here are some photos from Saturday’s festivities and stay tuned for videos coming soon. Friday pics can be seen at the following link. http://www.rcheliresource.com/event-photos-2009-heli-invasion-friday/
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