Shuttleworth Collection Season Premiere
Sunday 11th May 2025
Old Warden's hallowed ground once again opened the season with its traditional Season Premiere show that featured a number of stars, debuts and set pieces. A newer-look Shuttleworth lineup reflected down the season paid dividends with an exciting programme, divine weather and only a few no-goes due to a troublesome crosswind, and some heavy-hitting visitors on the ground and in the air kicked off the 2025 season with gusto.
reports from Old Warden for UK Airshow Review. Photography by the staff team.
For a couple of years at UKAR we've been maligning Shuttleworth's shows a little. The venue has lost none of its magic, none of its wonder, but a location that used to get many of our team going to multiple shows each year, even those in further reaches of the country, began to lose its appeal somewhat. The largest part of that is the prices - an adult day ticket, post-earlybird, now costs a whopping £40 or more for an afternoon's flying. That's a steep bill for anyone's wallet, but for a while it felt like the organisation's offerings have become a bit stale. The Collection is one of the most delightful in the world, but there's only so many times you can see the same planes sailing round the bend before it becomes samey, and it seemed that the organisers were, perhaps, leaning too heavily on their own aeroplanes and only sprinkling a handful of big pull visitors among them, and even then, sometimes a lot of them were familiar faces. At the increased prices, it was hard to justify attending more than one show a year, even with the best of forecasts.
2025 rolls round and it's all change at the airfield. The community has had announcement after announcement of genuine stars of the airshow circuit for the whole Shuttleworth calendar, each show offering a varied, interesting and genuinely quite exciting lineup. Clearly the aforementioned sentiments haven't been lost on the team running the events and it really appears to be a concerted effort, if the prices must be what they are, to then offer increased bang for your buck with your ticket. Some shows now feature an afternoon and evening programme, others have been moved to Saturdays to the benefit of long-distance visitors and the two-day format has returned for the Summer Festival of Flight. In fact, as we look ahead over the season, what has already been announced is making it quite hard to not attend most of the shows on the list and those you can't make you're almost rueful for. The Season Premiere was certainly no exception.
This year's Premiere was awash with airfield debuts, with the resident (but not collection-owned) DH.71 Tiger Moth (no, the other one) being perhaps the headline act. Sadly, on the day the strong crosswind which put paid to some of the First World War types also kept the Tiger Moth grounded - understandably, given that the type had only conducted its flight qualifications the week before. Another de Havilland rarity that did make it despite the winds was the Historic Aircraft Collection Airco DH.9. This phenomenally rare aeroplane has made few airshow appearances, but while it was a genuine sight to see it over the skies of Old Warden… it was very high in those skies. We're accustomed to seeing slow biplanes hauled round the corner at these shows so at the hands of Clive Denney it was a bit jarring to get only some undersidey, flat passes of a much-anticipated aeroplane, even a visitor. Even joined by the Collection's Bristol F2B which formed up at said altitudes almost seeming to try and drag it down a bit, it was a bit underwhelming.
Far more punchy on their debuts were some of the Second World War fighters. Accompanying the Collection's Spitfire Mk V on the programme was Spitfire Mk IX LZ842 from Biggin Hill, making its first display at the airfield, resplendent in its desert camouflage which absolutely glowed in the late afternoon sunlight. For what transpired to be the final display of the day, Mark Bennet took LZ842 through its paces, albeit perhaps a little far off at the start but soon swinging past the crowd to show off the beautiful scheme on the aircraft. Also making its display debut at Old Warden was P-51D ‘Marinell', flown by Isabel Rutland, that gave a traditionally powerful and whistly Mustang display. It's actually a testament to the refreshed variety that after so many seasons of multiple shows per calendar year the organisers can still fit Spitfires and Mustangs, two of the most common display warbirds on the circuit, that have never displayed at the airfield previously.
With Dakotas seemingly now a common sight at the airfield, the show hosted, for the first of three appearances at the venue this year, one of the UK's most exciting visitors in 2025. The Commemorative Air Force's Douglas R4D-6S was meant to attend last year's D-Day 80th celebrations but unfortunately never made it across the Atlantic, much to the disappointment of many European Dak-fans who were excited to see this extremely rare naval variant of the legendary C-47. The operators took notice of the interest in the aircraft and are conducting a European tour this year, including multiple airshow appearances. The aircraft was static only at the Season Premiere, but was a hugely popular attendee nonetheless. This Second World War veteran was parked at the top of the aircraft paddock, roped off and opened up to all to visit and many took advantage of the opportunity to get up close and inside the aircraft with the interest very much reciprocated by the crew who were on hand to show it off (just don't ask about the merch prices…). We can look forward to it taking part in the flying display at the Military Airshow and Festival of Flight later in the year.
Vintage civilian aviation was also aptly displayed at the event, ranging from the Electra 12A Junior which paired with the Collection Lysander for a Spies in the Skies section to Danny Williams' Pitts S1D Special. We don't normally associate the Pitts with the vintage element of airshow, but when you consider that the type first flew in 1944 it does rather fit the bill. For its part, G-PIII is “only” the better part of fifty years old but still flew a handy aerobatics routine in the pilot's just second year of display flying. The Electra Junior, too, flew a display well-suited to the airfields confines, and remains one of the most fascinating historic aircraft in the country.
Clearly, the new-look Shuttleworth is working. The Season Premiere was their third highest attended event of the last decade and to be fair, it felt very busy on the day. No doubt the good weather played its part in getting those numbers but it's hardly the only show with good weather over that period so we can only attribute the improved marketing and announcements as well as the lineup to getting that crowd through the door. And to Old Warden's eternal credit, even as busy as it was it never feels overcrowded, there's always a relaxed feel on the airfield. Mention has to go to the excellent commentary team, which included Adam Landau making his first public appearance on the Tannoy to much capability. Shuttleworth have got their 2025 season off with a bang - let's hope the rest of their calendar lives up to its potential!