When 90’s Britpop sensation Oasis announced they were reforming for a comeback tour, nobody would have thought the Gallagher brothers would be able to disrupt The Masterplan of the Royal Air Force Typhoon Display Team. The Coningsby based team was one of the star items billed for the Wales Airshow at Swansea on the 5th-6th July 2025 and would normally have operated out of Cardiff Airport. However, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Star‘s very first live performance in over 15 years was scheduled for the same weekend at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium. With demand for accommodation being extremely high, and hotel room costs being drastically inflated for that weekend, the Royal Air Force had to Acquiesce and operate from Bristol Airport instead.
The aircraft operated by The Royal Air Force Typhoon Display Team is the Eurofighter, which was developed in the heyday of Oasis, first taking to the skies in March 1994 just weeks before Oasis’s debut single Supersonic was released. The sounds of what could be argued as the greatest British musical act since The Beatles would of certainly rang out on the British Aerospace production line at Warton, Lancashire. Initially set up as a European consortium featuring the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Spain, and France, with the latter dropping out and developing the Dassault Rafale instead. Eurofighter entered service with the Royal Air Force, Luftwaffe, Aeronautica Militare and Ejército del Aire in 2003, the year that Oasis released Songbird, their 5th single from the album Heathen Chemistry. Since then, Eurofighter has successfully gained export customers including the Austrian Air Force, Kuwait Air Force, Qatar Emiri Air Force, Royal Air Force of Oman and the Royal Saudi Air Force and has seen Typhoons engage in operations across the Middle East and Libya, as well as NATO Air Policing missions across Europe. Eurofighter to this day is still being developed and upgraded and will be in service with air arms across the globe for many years to come.
Both 17(R) and 29(R) Squadron of the Royal Air Force carried out a limited number of capability demonstrations at major airshows such as The Royal International Air Tattoo and Farnborough International in the early 2000’s. Once the Typhoon Force was settled at RAF Coningsby the RAF Typhoon Display Team which is now Familiar to Millions was established in 2005 to showcase the extraordinary capabilities of the aircraft, a cutting-edge multirole combat aircraft central to the Royal Air Force’s operations All Around the World. In its twenty-year history there have only been two years when a display team has not been fielded, 2011 due to operational commitments whilst the Typhoon Force was engaged in Operation Ellamy, the UK element of the NATO led military intervention in Libya, and 2020 due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. In 2012 an unusual change was made with a frontline squadron fielding the display aircraft, 6 Squadron based at RAF Leuchars was chosen to display the Typhoon with Squadron Leader Scott Loughran, who had previously displayed the Typhoon in 2009 with 29(R) Squadron. The 2025 Typhoon Display Pilot is Sqn Ldr Nathan Shawyer who is no stranger to the southwest having grown up in Devon. Sqn Ldr Shawyer previously flew the Tornado with 31 Squadron, RAF Marham where he deployed to the Middle East, converting to the Typhoon in 2019 and being posted to 3(F) Squadron, RAF Coningsby where he deployed to the Falklands, Estonia, Romania, and the Middle East once again and in 2022 saw Shawyer returned to 29(R) to become a Qualified Flying Instructor.
The Supersonic Eurofighter Typhoon FGR.4s of 29(R) Squadron arrived at Bristol Airport on the Friday afternoon as Riot 01 and 02 in formation before breaking into the circuit and landing on Runway 27, taxying south side to operate from Centreline aviation’s apron. This isn’t the first time that the Royal Air Force Typhoon Display Team have operated out Bristol Airport though, having previous operated from there for both Bristol International Balloon Fiesta and Weston Air Day. Waiting to receive ZK311 and ZK344 were a team of hand-picked engineers each who had volunteered to be part of the team prior to going through a selection process which saw them being chosen for their ability to work in a small team away from their main operating base, whilst still having all of the required engineering authorizations with the ability to carry out complex engineering tasks There and Then no matter Whatever the issue in order to keep both the primary and spare aircraft available. This year saw three engineering teams named after recent Typhoon Display special scheme jets; BlackJack, Gina and Moggy. Each team has engineers from the Avionics, Information Communication Technology, Mechanical Engineering, and Weapons Systems trade groups. The engineers would have certainly had an early Sunday Morning Call to prepare the jet for its display at Swansea so that Sqn Ldr Shawyer’s display slot did not Slide away. Shawyer, callsign Reheat 01, in ZK311 successfully displayed to hundreds of thousands of members of the public Up In The Sky who gathered on the coastline around Swansea Bay in some challenging weather conditions, the sun certainly did Cast No Shadow. After three nights of Bristolian hospitality the aircraft departed Bristol Airport on Monday in all their Morning Glory with a very sedate pairs formation take off with on lookers watching the jets Fade Away into the cloud back to RAF Coningsby.
I Hope, I Think, I Know this Definitely Maybe will not be the last time that the Royal Air Force Typhoon Display Team will be operating out of Bristol Airport. All of us at South West Aviation Photographers will certainly be looking forward to it.
Report by Kev Slade, Gary Morris & Matt Sudol
© South West Aviation Photographers 2025