The Red Bull Air Race Fiasco ! TRAFFIC !!! ARGHHHHH

mandi_moles

Well....We left at 9am. Takes 1 hour 20 mins to get to longleat for us. 1am and we are still 10 miles from the site so we came home.
I saw so many cars with stickers on driving away from the site that had to give up as the whole area was blocked up.

I wonder how many tickets were sold and how many were used !

Ive written to the organisers and asked for a refund. Im well peeved, totally drained and well out of pocket :mad: I bet I dont get one though and as far as im concerned the whole thing is a huge rip off. Id say we saw around 100 cars with race stickers on them coming away from the area ! Thats £3500 extra profit for Red Bull !!

:mad: RED BULLSHI**

mandi_moles

They just added info to their site...

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DELAY OF RACE DUE TO WEATHER

We are still intending to run the Red Bull Air Race today with a delayed start depending on prevailing winds. We are constantly monitoring the weather and presently have every indication that the winds will decrease enabling the race to take place. We will keep you informed as soon as we receive any further updates. There have been a number of accidents in the local Longleat area which have caused traffic delays.

The event is NOT cancelled and the car parks are still open with plenty of capacity.

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So I guess we wont be able to get refunds as there were accidents and not their fault !! arghhh !! When we asked a policeman if it was all just traffic to longleat he said it was !! Weird....

K9cuddles

Oh dear.. my friends have gone to this..... .had alot longer drive too!

mandi_moles

Its just total chaos and its 10 miles radius of the site so good luck to them (if they made it)

mandi_moles

RESULT !!!

Due to adverse weather conditions it is with great regret that the Red Bull Air Race at Longleat has had to be cancelled.

The Air Race safety committee made this decision based on continued weather reports of strong winds making it too dangerous to fly.

All spectators who purchased tickets for the event will be refunded the full amount.

Qualification results from Friday will now stand as the official results for the Longleat Air Race. Therefore the results are as follows: 1. Paul Bonhomme (UK), 2. Peter Besenyei (HUN), 3. Kirby Chambliss (USA).

The Red Bull Air Race team and Longleat regret any disappointment caused by the cancellation of the event due to the weather, but the safety of both pilots and spectators is paramount.
ENDS

For further information please contact the UK Red Bull Communications Team:

Nina Darby 07793949950
Christie Poulos 07890275453
Nicola Andreason 07870150766

phil999_2

i gave up as well and glad i did.

K9cuddles

Omg..they will lose so much money!! Looks like my friend has a wasted journey then!

mandi_moles

Just had a text off them too ! Telling me its cancelled and full refund coming.
Yea I bet today cost them a fortune.
Only a shame we didnt know this morning...I knew it wasnt a good idea going today lol

sparkles.

I have just got home after we persevered with the traffic. What an absolute shambles - if you thought the traffic going in was bad you should have been in the traffic coming out :mad: Basically there were no stewards or lanes marked out just everybody driving to the exit from all directions, beeping, cutting each other up and queue jumping - it's amazing that nobody got seriously hurt.

In the event there was only one, fairly narrow, path leading to the best viewing areas with everyone pushing and shoving to get past each other and I started to get very concerned that my 8 yo son was going to get crushed. There was one woman who pushed between me and my OH and son only to use the most foul language at the stewards.

The whole cancellation of the race was a shambles too, it started to get pretty obvious that the weather was getting worse rather than better and the tannoy annoucemtents (when you could hear them over the sound of the helicopter!) saying one time for the start one minute and saying 45-60 minutes seconds later!! Even the cancellation was a shambles - the announcement said that they were going to make a decision in 15 minutes but people may wish to start making their way to the exits - they just refused to come out and say that the race was off.

I also ended up spending loads of money on the attractions to entertain my son, make up for the disappointment and to reward his good behaviour through the waiting.

So what should have been an hours drive each way was nearly five crawling along in the car through the traffic and what should have been an exciting day was spent sitting around in drizzle drinking a £1 cup of coffee from a klix vending machine that would have cost 20p elsewhere.

Also I bought my ticket from someone else and so it is completely down to their good nature as to whether or not I get my refund.

That said, my son's behaviour and a few good laughs while we were waiting around in the car made a bad day a lot better. But I have to say that the biggest disappointment was the way in which the people who attended behaved - I have been pushed, shoved and sworn at, the traffic was made a lot worse for some by the refusal of others to let people out in turns and the pushing in of lines - one car drove (quite fast!) for long way to push in the line of cars on the wrong side of the road.

Anyways, rant over - I have spent so much today that the bottle of wine I am going to enjoy pails into insignificance.....:A

yankee_rower

It tooks us 6 hours to get there from Farnborough and we finally got there at 3pm and milled around until it was officially cancelled. We actually had really good luck getting out as we were in the red car park and the marshalls were great and we were out of there really quick! Rather than heading for the A36, we went in the direction of Salisbury on the A350 and got there in under an hour. We stopped, had a meal at a nice pub and cut back across to the A303 and the total time back was under 2 hours.

Seems like this was a wise plan.

mandi_moles

We wont be going next year then !! ?? lol

And I thought the Farnbrough Air Show was bad !!

Sorry to all who lost out on a cumfy day in front on the TV.