Florida Jet Week

Scale, Aerobatics, Freestyle, and Formation—something for Everyone!

- Rich Uravitch

Florida Jet Week is a combination of the annual 22-year-old Florida Jets fly-in and the newer Red Flag competition. Promoter and Top Gun originator Frank Tiano conceived it as a means of bringing together RC enthusiasts with a love of sport and of scale jet models for an exchange of ideas and to provide an event that is truly exciting for spectators, even those not involved in the hobby.

For the “fun fly” Florida Jets portion, there is no judging or scoring, just pure jetting around a near-perfect Florida sky. The Red Flag component, however, is hotly contested with cash prizes and is based on participating fliers performing a series of maneuvers within different categories. The freestyle category had some exceptional fliers putting their monster jets through amazingly precise and sometimes dramatic maneuvers, all choreographed to music. Some of these fliers came from overseas and faraway places to provide a visual basis for comparison among the skills of fliers from other parts of the world. All were exceptional. The Team category really captured my interest, with five teams entered; watching them battle it out for top honors was truly an experience. When the smoke cleared (literally), Team Viper bested the group, followed by Team Nobody and Team Elite.