“I was given confirmation and authorization to go ahead and say that they are in fact going to extend their flight plan into Orange Beach,” Chris Litton of the City of Orange Beach. “They said they wouldn’t be doing aerobatics over the city’s beaches but we do flyovers and turnarounds.”

 

The Santa Rosa Island Authority is expected to announce more details about the show in a press conference tomorrow. We will publish the details of that press conference as soon as they are available. 

 

When the Blues announced that they were extending their Pensacola Beach Air Show to Perdido Key and expanding the to four days from July 8-11, Litton reached out to the Blues public relations department after getting the idea from an Orange Beach resident, OBA Community Website owner Ken Cooper.

 

“When we saw that the July Air Show has been extended to the west to include Perdido Key, Mayor Tony Kennon of the City of Orange Beach, Alabama, asked that I reach out to see if there is any possibility that the flight plan be extended two additional miles to the west to include Perdido Pass?” Litton wrote in an email to Lt. Adam Kerrick. “This would allow residents and guests along the Alabama beaches to observe the show without substantially increasing the density on Perdido Key. Any additional westward expansion of the show would only aid all of our efforts to maintain proper social distancing.”

 

He soon had his answer but with a caveat.

 

“I’ve just confirmed with the rest of the team that we will include Perdido Pass/Orange Beach in our plan during the Pensacola Beach flyover between July 8-11,” Kerrick wrote back. “You are cleared to announce this to your residents, but I’d like to clarify that these are flyovers and not aerobatic demonstrations.”

 

Litton then replied with a hint that he’d love it if they changed their mind and did some performance-type maneuvers.

“I told ‘em we wouldn’t hold it against them if they wanted to come over and do some aerobatics,” Litton said with a chuckle.