In the second of our RIAT arrivals air-to-air photoshoots, we focus on helicopters. Over the three days we had four helicopter join ups, with a total of five helicopters flying behind the Skyvan.

On the morning of Wednesday 17th a pair of German Army (Heer) NH Industries NH-90 TTH helis from the NH90 German Heideflieger Display Team (10th Tactical Helicopter Regiment based at Fassberg) came alongside, while that afternoon a mighty Sikorsky CH-53G Stallion from the Luftwaffe also paid a visit.

The afternoon of Thursday 17th saw two visitors in close succession, a Royal Norwegian Air Force Leonardo AW101-612 Merlin SAR helicopter from 330 Skvadron at Sola/Stavanger joined up, followed a few minutes later by special tail irish Air Corps Eurocopter EC135 P2 from 302 Squadron at Baldonnel.

While all the other helicopters that joined up were in standard paint schemes, except for the special external tanks on the NH90s, the tail of the Irish EC135, reg 270, was resprayed in the colours of the Aerospatiale SA342L Gazelle the force used to operate, and the reason for the scpecial scheme was to commemorate 60 years of Irish Air Corps helicopter operations.

It's always nice to do air-to-air photography with the "home team", even it's in another country, and the special tail EC125 being no exception.

A Big Thank You Goes To....
Eric Coeckelberghs and the Aviation PhotoCrew, as well as the Royal International Air Tattoo, for the opportunity to photograph all of these aircraft the air-to-air.