Ocean City Hosts Air Show and Airport Festival

All eyes will turn to the sky for Ocean City’s Air Show Weekend on Sept. 17 and 18. All events are free to attend. The celebration starts with the Ocean City Airport Festival on Saturday (Sept. 17) from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The festival features a ground display of unusual airplanes ranging from warbirds to helicopters. The event will feature a parachute jump from Team Fastrax, “America’s Skydiving Team.” It also will include food, music, classic cars and kids’ activities. The skydiving team will perform at the Airport Festival at 12 p.m., depending on wind and weather conditions. The half-mile “Runway Run” will return and is open to all ages. It offers a chance for anybody to cover ground normally traversed only by planes. The run will go off after the skydiving jump. The festival takes place at the Municipal Airport at 26th Street and Bay Avenue. Additional parking for the festival will be available at Shelter Road (off Tennessee Avenue) with free shuttle service provided. The Parachute Pyrotechnic Show will return to Ocean City at 8 p.m. Saturday (Sept. 17). The show consists of several highly trained and specially licensed Team Fastrax parachuters exiting an aircraft 6,000 feet above Ocean City’s beach and Boardwalk. Brilliant white or multi-colored projectile pyrotechnics are then ignited as the parachuters fly in formation, creating a dazzling display for spectators on the ground. The jump will end with a landing on the Seventh Street Beach and will be viewable along the entire Boardwalk. Fastrax skydiver Larry Compton is attached to a giant American flag while preparing to land on the beach to start the air show in 2021. The Boardwalk Aerobatic Air Show will bring some of the best stunt pilots and aerobatic champions in the nation to put on a show over the beach and Boardwalk starting at 1 p.m. Sunday (Sept. 18). Some of the performers will include:

• Mark Meredith Air Shows: Retired U.S. Navy Capt. Mark Meredith performs award-winning spins and aerobatics.
• David Windmiller Air Shows: Windmiller will execute gyroscopic tumbles, spins, aerial cartwheels, torque rolls and soaring feats of precision in a light and agile Zivko Edge 540.
• Kevin Russo Air Shows: Kevin is in his 22nd year flying air shows with his restored SNJ-6, which was built in 1944 and delivered to the Navy during World War II.
• Paul Dougherty: An energetic low-elevation routine of aerobatics performed in a biplane with smoke.
• Team Fasttrax: The team will make a jump to open the show.

Thousands of spectators typically soak up some of the final days of the calendar summer as they watch the spectacle from the beach and Boardwalk. The show is best viewed from the area between Fifth Street and 14th Street. There is no rain date for any of the shows, and air performances may be canceled if weather conditions do not allow for safe flying.