For years – especially in the country closer to the Escuela Militar de Aeronáutica in Pando – I’ve heard the whining dives of military trainer prop planes, but only recently have they appeared off the coast, and it’s not dives they’re doing but loop-de-loops! So there have been times we have aerial acrobatics visible from our front yard. Pretty cool.
Terrible video, I know. It’s almost impossible to track an object while zoomed on my little point-and-shoot camera. This is probably the most unaesthetic imagery I have ever posted, but you get the idea.
I was aware of four passes overhead today of the Uruguayan Air forces complete inventory of KC-130 Hercules aircraft. Mocha the dog did not approve of these unauthorized airspace intruders.
Why? Training, I suppose. Note that the first test flight of a KC-130 was in January 1960. I love that the aircraft of the Uruguayan Air Force are all models introduced over 50 years ago, one exception being the Embraer EMB 120 Brasilia, introduced “only” 40 years ago.
Strange sighting today: a black and a white helicopter flying along the coast. Then they do a huge circle and pass overhead before continuing on their way.
On the dog walk, a small twin engine jet went over quite low, headed northeast, which would mean maybe Porto Alegre as its destination. I thought I might look at FlightRadar24 when I got back, but forgot all about it until the same plane flew overhead, equally low, heading southeast out over the water.
But it’s a Brazilian Air Force plane, so I’m sure everything is completely normal.
A jet flew overhead, and out of curiosity I looked it up on flightradar24.com, finding this far more interesting flight path. A helicopter, obviously checking for something, finally returning to MVD
where it probably landed on the “X.”
What was it? Here things get strange.
It’s listed as a privately owned Bell 212 helicopter, illustrated with an image of a private jet, registered in the United States. That is certainly no private jet path, especially with an altitude as low as 50 feet at one point! And I seriously doubt a US registered chopper is doing surveillance in Uruguay.
But the jet is easily explained: N845RL is a US-registered jet. About which the photographer writes, “I have no idea what this private Learjet 45 is doing at Aero Sports Fair 2002 in Brazil wearing US Registration and flag. Anyway, welcome!”
Flightradar24 also says the helicopter private, which I doubt, however
I find no government Bell 212 helicopter registered in Uruguay. But the Wikipedia article mentions the military version called the Bell UH-1N Twin Huey, and
I know the Uruguayan Air Force has those.
While this is going on, I sent Syd a message with a link to the flight path which was very near his house (a couple times it got close enough to us that I could hear it, but I never saw it).
And he replied that he had just been watching the TWO helicopters, one white and one black, directly overhead. Being a bright day, the “black” may well have been military green, but the white? And why only one on the radar?
A bit of strangeness to make the day more interesting.
Though we rarely heard planes before, despite being close to the airport, it wasn’t because they weren’t there. Now we rarely hear planes because planes are rare. Last couple mornings I’ve heard them, gotten curious, and seen some interesting patterns on flightradar24.
Here a flight that has already circled overflew the airport and circled some more off our coast.
I guess because of this flight in from Paraguay, which also had to circle, presumably for the plane already on the ground.
And then the plane circling offshore has to wait for an incoming flight from Madrid.
And finally gets back on final approach.
And so this morning:
More circling, this time to allow a flight from Panama, seriously behind schedule, land.
Wheee! Why do you do this? I hear you ask. Well, it’s more interesting than cutting the lawn in sweltering heat, for one thing….
In the country, we often see one or two prop-driven trainers from the Uruguay Air Force, which has a base nearby in Pando. All depends on whether they have fuel or not. Seriously.
In town, the window near my desk faces the ocean, so I get to see what’s flying back and forth between Montevideo and Punta del Este. Very little, usually; some corporate-type helicopters occasionally, or a Vietnam-War-era Huey helicopter (introduced in 1956).
Today, three Air Force jets flew out and then back, and seven prop planes in formation, none of which I’ve ever seen before. I had to look them up: the jets appear to be Cessna A-37 Dragonflies (introduced in 1964):
The prop planes I’m guessing are Aermacchi SF.260s (also introduced in 1964):
Which all seems hopelessly quaint, especially compared to mighty (and mighty expensive) beasts like the US F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and the F-22 Raptor, but the fact remains that the little planes of the Fuerza Aérea Uruguaya are actually flying (unlike the F-35) and not killing their pilots (one of those unfortunate things the F-22 tends to do).
