Those of you who know me from the radio shows may have gathered that I live by an RAF base - just to identify why I'm commenting on this.

Now today is the Queens Birthday and for the 6th year in a row it coincides with my daughters school fete - so we get the added freebie of a Royal fly past. In previous years this has been quite spectacular - with many forms of aircraft present.

So today I'm doing the BBQ (as usual) facing east and looking forward to something better than we got for the Royal Wedding.

What we get is - 2x Tornados 2x Typhoons (I think - I was flipping burgers at the time) - a small Royal Flight jet and the Red Arrows (who kindly drop smoke as they approach the flightline)

Sort of felt cheated - in the same way I did on the Royal Wedding day with the Battle flight and little else.

My question to the more aviation minded of you in here is - is this a reflection of funding difficulties in the RAF or a more environmental attitude - or perhaps we aren't that interested in seeing a spectacle?

It's not budget bro.
Just all of the real jets are busy at the moment helping us kill brown people in many parts of the world.
Happy bday to the kid though.