Northern Star Aero Team ready to take to the sky at air show

By SAMANTHA JOHNSON, Special to the News on July 23, 2022.

Medicine Hat Family Fun and Flight presents the Dave Rozdeba Memorial Flight on Monday, July 25 from 12-6 p.m. – held in honour of Dave Rozdeba, chairman and Air Boss, who passed in 2017 from cancer.

The air show itself will start later in the day. Chairman, Robbie Watson said, “There will be some scheduled flying around 4:45-5 p.m., so hopefully the end-of-the-day work crowd can make it out to watch.”

HALO will be doing a demonstration and Northern Star Aero Team – a three-ship team consisting of special aircraft flown by military and ex-military – will be putting on an aerobatic show.

Super T Aviation, another supporter of the event, is offering sight seeing flights for $30 per person.

“All bookings will be made on-site during show time. There are no pre-bookings and I recommend anyone who wants a ride to come early and get their name on the list because they fill up pretty fast,” said Watson.

HALO will also be on site, as will some static airplanes for people to look at: a Harvard (WWII era plane) from the west coast and a Bell 412 from Portage la Prairie.

The Medicine Hat RC’ers will be out there as well with their model airplanes, and food trucks are also coming for anyone wishing to get a bite to eat.

The big change for this year’s event will be parking. To alleviate congestion at the airport intersection on Highway 3, traffic will be routed around 10th Avenue and 30th Street so everyone is making a right turn into the airport. There will be signage along the route as well as to the off-site/overflow parking, which will be used if the onsite parking gets full. A shuttle bus will run between the off-site parking and the airport. Directions and more information are available at http://www.familyfunflight.ca and on their Facebook page.

It is a free event to attend. Usually a bi-annual occasion, one was held last year and after this show it will go back to being every two years.

“We didn’t find out until a couple of weeks before the (2021) show that we could hold one, but it was really successful,” said secretary-treasurer Trish Nardari.

Greg’s Remedy Rx is the title sponsor of the event and organizers are grateful for their support

Nardari explained the entire event is paid for by sponsors. In years past they’ve been awarded the Community Vibrancy Grant, although didn’t manage to secure it for this year but wanted to acknowledge the support of the City of Medicine Hat.

“It’s an event the whole community looks forward,” said Nardari. “And we are happy, with the help of our sponsors, to be able to put it on.”