Air Show 101: If you make the connections, they will come!

Believe it or not, the planning for Prairie Air Show 2011 began the week after Prairie Air Show 2010. It started at Oshkosh AirVenture 2010 – "The World's Greatest Aviation Celebration".

Okay, so this is how the story goes…I met Jerry “Jive” Kerby (USAF pilot, ret.) at the Oshkosh air show. Oshkosh is one of the best places to find the coolest acts and get the skinny on what’s going on in the air show biz.

Jive and I talked about Prairie Air Show, and he kept saying how he knew about our show and how great a reputation the show has in the business. He went on to tell me how he and Dale “Snort” Snodgrass (USN pilot, ret.) both wanted to come and perform at our show sometime. He kept telling me he had something up his sleeve, but he wasn’t at liberty to discuss it.

The next I heard from Jive was in October 2010. He asked if we would be interested in hosting their newly formed team and explained the whole concept of his “Heavy Metal Jet Team;” but he swore me to secrecy because they had not made the existence of the team public yet.

The next contact I had was mid-November 2010 by the Heavy Metal Jet Team publicist, L.M. “Lunar” Sawyer.

It was a done deal. Not only would we be hosting the Heavy Metal Jet Team, but we were to be one of the first shows on their schedule!

Heavy Metal Jet Team is a five-ship, aerobatic, civilian-owned jet team and will be fully sponsored by United Bank Card, Inc (UBC) for its first year. The team will boast four L-39’s and one T-33 all in the Arctic camouflage paint scheme. Heavy Metal Jet Team will be dedicating its first season to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

So, we welcome the newly formed team of Lt. Colonel Jerry “Jive” Kerby, Captain Dale “Snort” Snodgrass, Jared “Rook” Isaacman, Doug “H-Dog” Demko, Major John “Slick” Baum, Major Sean “Stroker” Gustafson, and Commander Mike “Buick” Eberhardt, to Prairie Air Show 2011.

It’s always exciting to host a brand new act – you may never know what you’re going to get, but you know it’s going to be great!

Blue Skies,
Brett

To learn more about what other great acts are going to be at Prairie Air Show 2011, visit www.prairieair.org and to learn more about the Heavy Metal Jet Team, visit www.heavymetaljetteam.com.