JSOH 2008 ADW

Joint Services Open House (JSOH) 2008 at Andrews Airforce Base

Not sure who ran the event this year but, they seriously need to reconsider the security at this event and have enough capacity to handle the crowds in a much more efficient manner. I stood on line with thousands of other attendees for over 3 hours. There just was not enough Metal Detectors in place to handle the record turn out. The bus ride to the base was delayed by traffic on I-495 and then on the local streets. Local and State Police and Military Police gave no preference to the special show buses and we were subject to another hour of waiting to disembark on the show floor. I parked my car at 9:00am and took my first shot outside the bus on the Andrews tarmac at around 12:35pm.

I missed the C-17, the B-2 Flyby, the F-104 Starfighters and the P-51 Aerial demos. What was likely an excellent show was marred by inefficient preparation by the military for the large turnout. The weather on Sunday was declared RAINY so everyone decided to come on Saturday. Given that Friday's show was rained out and the capacity of three days of airshow was compressed into one.

I hope that next year the Air Force and the Military and Local and State police are able to better handle the security and traffic.

I must give thanks to the coordination efforts by the Metro Transit of Maryland and D.C. as they put in the best show on hand with basically ZERO delays in the management of people on to the many buses, speedy transit (when appropriate) and discharge. They moved thousands without a single snag. I never waited more than 30 seconds for a bus either to or from the show!


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