Evert Keijzer kindly provided us with his photos and report on the May 2007 air show at BA.701 Salon de Provence, France.

The French Air Force Base in Salon de Provence (Base de Arienne 701) hosted the first out of five air shows (meeting de l'air) organized by the Armée de l'Air (AdlA - French Air Force) for 2007. Salon as the base is commonly abbreviated, is situated in the south of France in the beautiful Provence near the Mediterranean Sea. It is home to various AdlA flying schools and the national display team Patrouille de France (Pdf) flying with eight Alpha Jet training aircraft since 1982.

The air show also celebrated 70 years of pilot training at this location, the sunniest region of France. Only a handful of foreign visitors attended the show, among them two other large aerobatic display teams, the Patrouille Suisse and the Italian Frecce Tricolore.

The flying display was a pleasant mix of vintage and modern fighters and trainers, and aerial demonstrations of helicopters and the Securité Civile flying their water bombers.

The static display was small, consisting of the usual Armée de l'Air aircraft and some warbirds. Unfortunately not many foreign participants were seen in the static show.

The weather was very good on the arrival and practise days with clear skies and 27 Celsius in the shadow. In these conditions photography can be challenging with a lot of unsharp images due to severe heat haze. The show day itself was not blessed with sunny skies, as there was a very high overcast nearly all day.

Fortunately your photographer was there for the entire weekend, and a small selection of the photos are shown here.