Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show 2006 Pictures and Video

Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show 2006
Pictures and a video clip from my trip to the Ft. Lauderdale Florida Air & Sea Show on May 6th 2006.

Main Menu Home Digital Cameras Misc. Pictures Articles My Blog

Attention: The 2008 Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show has been cancelled due to lack of a title sponsor. I was really looking forward to going to this event next weekend, May 3rd & 4th '08. Hopefully they'll find a sponsorship to bring it back in 2009.

Downtown Ft. Lauderdale

National Guard Display

U.S. Army Simulator

Every year during Fleet Week, the beach at Sunrise and A1A hosts the Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show. This year the event was sponsored by McDonald's, so technically it was called the McDonald's Air & Sea Show.

Thousands of people from all over Florida showed up for the event and packed the Fort Lauderdale Beach. My friends arrived early and were lucky enough to snag a good spot on the sidewalk with some breathing room. The beach itself was just a densely packed blur of brightly colored bikinis and sun umbrellas.

It was a very hot day with the temperatures soaring into the high 80's. Luckily our car wasn't parked too far from the beach at the Galleria Mall parking lot. The parking fee was $15.00 which benefited a local charity.

Ft. Lauderdale Intracoastal

As we walked from the Galleria Mall parking garage, I snapped a picture of the Ft. Lauderdale Intracoastal off the Sunrise Blvd bridge, and the U.S. Army tank simulator trailer. The Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, and National Guard also had displays or activity tents set up for event attendees to explore. Another popular spot for watching the McDonald's Air & Sea Show was the Hugh Taylor Birch State Recreation Area.

Bruce Rossmeyer's Harley Village

Hugh Taylor Birch Rec. Area

I took a picture of the Bruce Rossmeyer's Harley Village entrance that towered above one of the side streets, but upon walking into the area, I didn't spot a single Harley Davidson Motorcycle so I'm not sure the reason for the display. The Goodyear Blimp and a American Airlines 767 roaring above our heads reminded me to continue walking towards the beach. The Air & Sea Show official program listed the variety of U.S. military and civilian aircraft that would be soaring above the spectators on Ft. Lauderdale beach, and the names of the Air Force and Navy boats that were anchored near by in the Atlantic Ocean.

From 9-11 AM the water along Sunrise Blvd and A1A was made frothy by the Super Boat Grand Prix. We arrived too late for the boat race but we didn't miss the U.S. Marine Corps staging a fake beach invasion, which was followed by the U.S. Army Golden Knights parachuting precisely onto a big red "X" on the beach.

I'm not an expert at identifying air planes, but the program listed all the planes including the Air Force B-2 Stealth Bomber, AA DC-3, F-14 Tomcat (Tom Cruise's jet in Top Gun), F-16 Falcon, F-117, F-15 Strike Force Jet, F-22 Raptor jet, U.S. Navy Blue Angels, U.S. Air Force Warthog jet, the Canadian Snowbirds, the U.S. Navy Blue Angels, and the Jayhawk helicopter. To see these U.S.A. military planes in action check out my video clip down below.

Canadian Snowbirds

After a long couple of hours in the hot South Florida sun, we decided to pack our things up and walk back across the Sunrise Blvd. bridge to the Galleria Mall parking lot to leave the Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show. The Fort Lauderdale Fire Rescue Station had thoughtfully set up a shower on the bridge to cool the departing spectators. Luckily we left just in time to avoid the rush at the end of the show. It didn't take very long for us to get out of the parking garage and on to the I-95 highway. I think next year I'd like to go earlier in the morning and get a good spot on the beach so that my pictures and video of the Ft. Lauderdale Air & Sea Show won't be limited by the palm trees that line A1A. To see my two minute long WMV (Windows Media Video) movie clip from the show, click on the link at the bottom of this page. See you next year at the 2007 Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show!

Fort Lauderdale Air & Sea Show Video Clip (2 Minutes, 9MB, 700Kb/s)
(Right Click & Choose "Save Target As")

Main Menu Home My Digital Cameras Misc. Pictures Articles My Blog