Salthill Airshow is no more guys..

Steyr

Hi guys it is with a heavy sad heart that i have to announce that the Salthill Airshow is no more due to lack of funds from Galway City Council and others......... A terrible sad day im disgusted shame on all the people who put down the trojan work that has gone into this to make it absolutely FREE for everybody and you will never EVER see Salthill as busy as it was on any Airshow day, Airshows happen all over the world and the Organisers pulled in everything for us like the RAF Red Arrows and the USAF Thunderbirds for FREE im disgusted when the likes of the GAAW do what they do you make me SICK TO MY STOMACH. GAAW the effect you have had on the Airshow and now the local economy is sickening your entitled to your views but you went too far Airshows happen everywhere Salthill will now return to a Ghost Town, You make me sick.





To Brian McGrath,Carolyn Shiels and Tony Gibson i bow my hat to you, thanks for the memories.

:mad::mad::mad:

Davidth88

Sad day indeed

Sorry for my ignorance , what / who are GAAW ?

Davidth88

Sorry just Googeled GAAW.

What have these guys got against the Airshow , do they see it as gloryfing war or something ?

I hate war as much as the next man , but I just love watching aeroplanes !

bill_ashmount

Davidth88 wrote: »

Sorry just Googeled GAAW.

What have these guys got against the Airshow , do they see it as gloryfing war or something ?

I hate war as much as the next man , but I just love watching aeroplanes !

They're just people with too much time on their hands

ejmaztec

It's a great shame. There are few enough air-displays in Ireland as it is.

The GAAW seem to be candidates for Extraordinary Rendition, as I would imagine that their cards have already been marked in Virginia.

Chiron

That is very, very sad news. I have been going to Salthill for at least 7 years now and every single one of them has been brilliant.

Who will ever forget the RAF Typhoon last year....words fail me.

A huge thank you to all of the team who brought us these shows over the years.

Styer, to what extent did the GAAW play in the making of this decision?

Steyr

Chiron wrote: »

A huge thank you to all of the team who brought us these shows over the years.

Styer, to what extent did the GAAW play in the making of this decision?

Thank you for all the Support guys. The GAAW said we were "Warshow" Organisers and put us down at every turn etc etc you get the idea...

cp251

I don't think you can blame the GAAW. They had scheduled their annual attempt to block the council funding for the airshow on the 10th of December. In truth despite their attempt to portray themselves as the voice of Galway citizens. They remain a small bunch of cranky anti American lefties who only represent themselves and were mostly ignored or derided by the good citizens of Galway and indeed most of the council. It's unlikely that the council would have withdrawn what little funding there was at their behest.

I think the blame might be more accurately aimed at the local businessmen of Galway who raked in the cash wrought by visitors to the airshow but failed to support it in any meaningful way. The council too should accept some blame. The grant they gave was hardly enormous.

No doubt the truth will out in due course. Galway has a habit of messing up things. What with traffic, poisoned water, jobs:rolleyes: and now the airshow. It wouldn't happen in the Republic of Cork, boy!

Steyr

cp251 wrote: »

I don't think you can blame the GAAW.

Its funding not them, they are just a pain.

ch252

I don't know what to say, it was always great to go up to the tower or go into Salthill for the airshow, it was almost on par with the races, It has become part of Galways heritage. Sickening to think that they think that they can just pull it out like that, What were the grounds on which they didn't provide funding? I don't think people would mind paying a couple of euro to see it, but I know you have the whole problem of how to charge them etc. etc.
Thats all I'm saying on the matter before I say something illegal, It is a disgrace, so is everyone who was involved in shutting it down.

Darragh
-F****NG annoyed.

WeeDiddly

This is a ridicule. I'm 15, and this year was the only dam year I was able to go, I had never any transport to go up, because my parents never bothered going. I got them to go this year, and we call drove back home in the evening, with the pleasure of looking forward to the 2008 airshow. Not anymore though.

As for the GAAW, why the hell would a few people set up a company to fight against a pointless thing like this, carrying stupid signs. It's not like we were watching a war happening in the sky's above Salthill, it was merely a few aircraft(capable of war) that were doing fly-by's. None of them were carrying any missile whatsoever, so as regards the GAAW, I hope one day, i can have the pleasure of organising a meeting for them in some field, and a war plane does come and bomb them. Maybe, i may be speaking extreme, but thats how I feel.

And yes, I do blame the GAAW for having at least, some part in what has happened, as some people may know, like myself having such knowledge of funding systems, the galway county council and other funding companies are given a strict budget, and one term of how they spend their budget is that they can't give money to any organisation or event which does not act in the best interests of every party. I know ther Galway City Co. had their own part to play in the drama of withdrawing such funding, that means that they were also trying to withdraw funding so they could put it somewhere else, but I shall take pleasure in seeing the tourism numbers for that weekend dropping and I hope them eejits get what the deserve, a good kick right up their backside's.

As regards the organisers of the event. I think a big massive thank you and congrats to running the air show over the last few years. It takes a lot of time and effort to organise a cycling race, never mind an aviation show. Organising things like this aren't too hard... until, you find that there are alliance groups set up against you, people calling you warlords, local funding authorities nehaving like utter gobsh\tes and having to fit in work, and family in on top of that. Undeserved stress... and years of good work has just been thrown back in their faces by idiots with signs calling us warlords, and buildings in Galway City Centre costing millions of euro, and people in them sitting in the best of furniture vesting interests and sestroting what was once part of Galways great culture.

I hope everyone is happy with themselves now. Ye all managed to get rid of Salthill's biggest annual event...

vulcan57

Sad, sad day for Salthill and Galway in general. The hardest thing to swallow is that the GAAW are now jumping for joy and claiming "victory". If I had my way I'd take them all out, line them up against a wall (wouldn't have to be a big one, there aren't that many of them) and show them first hand what weapons of war can do! It makes my blood boil to think that there is a totally voluntary committee that dedicate 9 or 10 months a year to providing a free air show all for what? Heart ache and stress when they are promised money that does'nt materialise and businesses that fill their pockets with money on the back of the air show and run straight to the bank before donating a thing to help it continue. Well next year they will feel it. I echo Styre's sentiment that Brian, Carolyn and Tony all deserve a medal for the sterling work they have put in.

WeeDiddly

vulcan57 wrote: »

Sad, sad day for Salthill and Galway in general. The hardest thing to swallow is that the GAAW are now jumping for joy and claiming "victory". If I had my way I'd take them all out, line them up against a wall (wouldn't have to be a big one, there aren't that many of them) and show them first hand what weapons of war can do! It makes my blood boil to think that there is a totally voluntary committee that dedicate 9 or 10 months a year to providing a free air show all for what? Heart ache and stress when they are promised money that does'nt materialise and businesses that fill their pockets with money on the back of the air show and run straight to the bank before donating a thing to help it continue. Well next year they will feel it. I echo Styre's sentiment that Brian, Carolyn and Tony all deserve a medal for the sterling work they have put in.

Amen to that, and if you want help with that thing at the wall...

Punchy07

I'm absolutely gutted.I owe a lot to the salthill airshow,after doing my leaving cert I was confused,college or train to be a pilot?For 13 years leading up to then I wanted to be a pilot but had a change of mind when I done well in my leaving and could have done an interesting course,so to find out for sure weather or not being a pilot was for me I went up to the airshow for the 4th year in a row and it was a re awakening!Going home in the car that night after the airshow I decided there and then to go down the flying road and im currently training for my PPL and loving every second of it

I cannot for the life of me understand why it has folded!?!?It's a serious blow to the local economy and to aviation enthuasiasts throughout Ireland,it had turnouts that rivalled the all ireland final every year without fail,shame on all those who forced this event to end!It's terrible not being able to go on to the official website and watch out for updates on nexts years show:mad:


p.s Thanks to all the organisers that made the show happen for the last number of years

cp251

Don't give the GAAW any credit. They could never had stopped the show anyway. In practice they weren't actually against the airshow per se, merely the military side of it. In the famous red balloon thing they organised only 50 people turned up. They can go back to organising conferences for terrorist mouthpieces again.

This may not be the end, perhaps 2009 could see the return of the show. Maybe the business community in Galway need a short sharp shock. You can be quite sure there is plenty of sponsorship for the races and the arts festival obviously because of the revenue it generates. But Galway has it's own peculiar way of doing things.

The truth is Ireland and airshows have always been a problem. Remember the air spectaculars? That self destructed too over money, despite attracting enormous crowds and charging entrance fees.

Edit: The Galway Independant dropped through the door pretty much confirming it was not so much the antis, who are delighted of course, but they general lack of funding. In fact, only on Monday night the council budget committee overwhelming rejected a motion to cut the grant to the airshow unless 'warplanes' were excluded. So the council were well in favour. But then again they only granted 15,000 Euro. A drop in the bucket really.

Interesting that the airshow shared front page headlines with the Abbott closure. Tells you something that.

vulcan57

And why is it that the Galway arts festival get €70k and they charge entrance fees for practically all events? they must take in €100,000s. Not knocking the Galway arts festival, but something is not right somewhere.

Punchy07

I'd imagine the local business' will get an awful shock when they compare their accounts for 2008 with their accounts from 2007 and hopefully it will make them re think their decision to head for the hills when the airshow organisers came knocking on their doors for some support

I do not see why both the business' and the council left the airshow in the cold this year,the positives outmumber the negatives ten times over

Btw steyr they were willing to offer 15,000 i believe?? which the organisers say isnt enough,what had they being offering for previous shows?

Steyr

Punchy07 wrote: »

Btw steyr they were willing to offer 15,000 i believe?? which the organisers say isnt enough,what had they being offering for previous shows?

15,000 Every year, totally underfunded.

RoundyMooney

This story also merited a few column inches in yesterday's Independent.

Again, the tree huggers were mentioned.

Sad to see it go. I always enjoyed putting in the few hours in the Park, getting close to the helicopters going in and out.

Please God, it won't be permanent.

Oilrig

Sad, but...

In fairness, if you were going to try and run an airshow with warbirds etc, Galway would be the last place you'd consider...

Big opening here for somewhere...

knighted

firstly ive never been to the airshow but understand how you all feel about its cancellation -i read somewhere that 80,000 euros runs the show ?
if this figure is correct its not beyond possibilitys that this sum can be raised in time to fund the 2008 show -there are businesses out there who could sponsor an event of this size easily and some firms that are actually looking for events to sponsor for the coming year -its all about marketing and the more you can spread the word thru the internet to other forums etc you might just make contact with someone who can aid you -you will never know unless you try but the last thing i would be doing is lying down and let jumped up nobodys kick me in the nuts -from reading peoples responces i can tell you are all passionate about the salthill airshow ,so do something about it ,start by banding together and seeing what you come up with ,the maddest ideas could be the ones that work for you -

are there any national or multinational companys locating in galway in the coming year ? if there is they might be interested in funding your event as an introduction

Steyr

Oilrig wrote: »

In fairness, if you were going to try and run an airshow with warbirds etc,

Who said we were running or going to run it on Warbirds/Military acts?? Nobody thats who, we have always had a nice mix of Military/Private and Civillian as more or less every other Airshow worldwide has, the above really was a silly statement.

Mweelrea

I Hate GAAW!!!
Is there any other airshow's in Ireland that could possibly replace it???

Mweelrea

Steyr wrote: »

Who said we were running or going to run it on Warbirds/Military acts?? Nobody thats who, we have always had a nice mix of Military/Private and Civillian as more or less every other Airshow worldwide has, the above really was a silly statement.

exactly there was a mix of everything from the aviation world which makes GAAW's arguement pointless