The 2009 Go Guard! South Carolina Air and Ground Expo was held at the McEntire JNGB on October 10 & 11, 2009. This was the first open house show that has been put on at this base in over ten years, so it was greatly anticipated by the eager crowd.

  Base commander Col. Scott Williams welcomed everyone and the show opened with the U.S. Army Golden Knights doing a Flag Jump with the base’s band playing the National Anthem and the USAF Honor Guard Drill Team displaying the colors.

  Next on the schedule was a 4-ship flyby of the F-16 Falcons by the S.C. Air National Guard 169^th Fighter Wing, called the Swamp Foxes, followed by S.C. Army National Guard UH-60 Blackhawk and AH-64 Apache Long Bow helicopter demos.

  The Blackhawk did two demos, one showing the use of a Bambi bucket to assist in fire fighting and the other of how the helicopter can be used as an aerial crane to bring in or pickup a Hummer vehicle in the field.

  The Army Aviation Heritage Foundation Sky Soldiers put on two different demonstrations. The morning demo was a Vietnam era reenactment of a pilot search and rescue they call ‘Rescue At Dawn’. In this demonstration they make use of two different types of fixed wing aircraft and three different types of helicopters, as well as ground force enactors and pyro. The afternoon demonstration involved four Cobra attack helicopters that performed formation flying and precision maneuvers.

  Exciting aerial aerobatics were performed by John Klatt in the Air Guard S600, Rob Holland in an MX-2 and the Firebirds Xtreme Aerobatic team. Solo demonstrations were done by Fowler Cary in a vintage Thunderbird T-33, and Vlado Lenoch in a P-51D Mustang.

  The USAF F-16C Viper East Demonstration Team did a full tactical demonstration of the F-16 fighter. That was followed by an aerobatic demonstration of the F-16 fighter by Bill Gigliotti of the Lockheed-Martin Corporation. The Lockheed-Martin factory demos are rarely flown at U.S. air shows, so having it at this show was a special treat.

  The finale for the show was a Combined Arms Demo put on by the “Citizen Soldiers” men and women of the South Carolina National Guard. The demo opened with 4 of the SC ANG Vipers doing an air assault on an enemy position. The enemy shot up smokey SAMs at the Vipers and the F-16s released flares as counter measures. In the simulation, one of the Vipers is hit and the pilot ejects and must be recued.

  The combined arms demo continued with two Apache attack helicopters flying in to attack enemy positions around the downed pilot. Fire from the Apaches was simulated with rows of pyro explosions. After the Apaches have suppressed the enemy, M-1 Abrams and M-2 Bradley tanks came tearing across the field towards the downed pilot. The M-2 Bradley tanks were carrying ground forces that came out and helped protect the pilot while waiting for a Blackhawk helicopter to fly in and pickup the pilot.

 The combined arms demo ended with the tanks pulling up close to the crowd line fence. The Blackhawk helicopter flanked by an Apache helicopter on each side hovered behind the tanks. Just as the F-16s flew from behind the crowd over the tanks and helicopters, the Rich’s Incredible Pyro crew set off their famous wall of flames.

The combined arms demo has to rank as one of the best ‘headliner’ acts that I have seen at any air show this season. It provided a very realistic look into how all of the military services work together to get the job done and how professional the ‘Weekend Warriors’ of the National Guard are. The men and women of the South Carolina National Guard should be saluted for a job well done and for a terrific air show, which they hope to do again in 2011.