Flight festival grounded
Published 9:34 pm Thursday, March 26, 2015
A plane is on display at the 2014 Virginia Regional Festival of Flight at Suffolk Executive Airport. This year’s event has been canceled, organizers said, but they hope to bring it back to Suffolk next year.
After calling Suffolk Executive Airport home since 2008, the Virginia Regional Festival of Flight won’t be returning this May as it takes a hiatus.
Suffolk resident Ray Batton, president of the Virginia Aviation Council, said festival organizers decided to take a year off to revamp the event.
“Instead of doing it halfway, we wanted to make sure we had some time to plan it,” Batton said, noting the organizers have had trouble roping in new, young volunteers and getting fresh ideas. “We’re trying to generate interest to entice other people to get involved.”
The festival had been housed at the Dinwiddie airport for about 10 years prior to its move to Suffolk. It featured two days of airplane competitions, close-up viewing of a number of different types of aircraft, seminars and displays, as well as the recent addition of an air show.
Economic Development Director Kevin Hughes said he was notified last month that the festival would not come this year. He noted the event had suffered from “three straight years of weather that didn’t necessarily cooperate.”
Simple cloud cover, even if it’s not producing any rain, can ruin an event to which most people are flying small craft.
“It doesn’t necessarily have to be raining,” he said.
Hughes said the airport will miss out on a spike in fuel sales that weekend, but he didn’t anticipate much other economic impact. Most folks who flew to the event enjoyed camping at the site, so there likely wasn’t a lot of hotel revenue, he said.
Batton said there are no plans to move the event to a different airport when it returns next year.
“We’re not planning on moving at this point,” he said. “Right now, the next one’s planned in 2016.”
Hughes noted the Suffolk airport’s main assets for a large event is its space.
“We physically have a lot of space to accommodate a lot of people,” Hughes said. “The space isn’t going anywhere, so we look forward to having them come back. We’re fully behind the Festival of Flight. I think it’s a great idea they try to regroup and look at how best to attack it.”
