Thunder City is an aircraft operating and maintenance company based at the

Cape Town International Airport Cape Town International Airport is the primary international airport serving the city of Cape Town, and is the second-busiest airport in South Africa and fourth-busiest in Africa. Located approximately from the city center, the airport wa ...

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

, South Africa. It was well known for owning the largest civilian collection of former military jet aircraft in the world. These aircraft were used to perform in

airshows An air show (or airshow, air fair, air tattoo) is a public event where aircraft are exhibited. They often include aerobatics demonstrations, without they are called "static air shows" with aircraft parked on the ground. The largest air show ...

and could also be chartered by the general public for recreational flights, including going

supersonic Supersonic speed is the speed of an object that exceeds the speed of sound ( Mach 1). For objects traveling in dry air of a temperature of 20 °C (68 °F) at sea level, this speed is approximately . Speeds greater than five times ...

and climbing to altitudes around 50,000 feet. Following a fatal accident in 2009 in which an English Electric Lightning crashed at an airshow, the company ceased flying operations after the accident investigation found major shortcomings in its maintenance programme. The company's other activities include upgrading older models of the Aerospatiale Puma

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attribu ...

with modern avionics and renovating airframes and engines.

Company structure

Thunder City Holdings (Pty) Ltd. is the parent company of several subsidiaries: * Thunder City Aircraft Company * Thunder City Aircraft Maintenance Company * Thunder City Education * Thunder City Aircraft Entertainment * Thunder City Flying Company * Thunder City Property Company

Fleet

Some of the aircraft are the most recently airworthy examples of the type. * Three

English Electric Lightning The English Electric Lightning is a British fighter aircraft that served as an interceptor during the 1960s, the 1970s and into the late 1980s. It was capable of a top speed of above Mach 2. The Lightning was designed, developed, and manufa ...

. One T5 was lost in an accident on 14 November 2009. * Three

Blackburn Buccaneer The Blackburn Buccaneer is a British carrier-capable attack aircraft designed in the 1950s for the Royal Navy (RN). Designed and initially produced by Blackburn Aircraft at Brough, it was later officially known as the Hawker Siddeley Buccane ...

s. * Seven

Hawker Hunter The Hawker Hunter is a transonic British jet-powered fighter aircraft that was developed by Hawker Aircraft for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It was designed to take advantage of the newly developed Rolls-Ro ...

s. * One Aerospatiale Puma, a demonstrator of the company's upgrade and refurbishment services. * One

Gloster Javelin The Gloster Javelin is a twin-engined T-tailed delta-wing subsonic night and all-weather interceptor aircraft that served with Britain's Royal Air Force from the mid-1950s until the late 1960s. The last aircraft design to bear the Gloster na ...

FAW Mk.1 (

RAF The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

No. XA553). Mounted as a "Gate Guard" on display at the entrance to the company premises. In October 2012, three Lightnings, three Buccaneers and four Hawker Hunters were put up for sale.

AAD 2008 controversy

During a display flight at the 2008 African Aerospace and Defence (AAD) show in Cape Town a pair of Thunder City Lightnings flew close to the city at supersonic speed. Only the higher one of the pair was planned to fly supersonic as it was considered to be high enough so as not to cause alarm, however the lower aircraft also broke the sound barrier. The resulting

sonic boom A sonic boom is a sound associated with shock waves created when an object travels through the air faster than the speed of sound. Sonic booms generate enormous amounts of sound energy, sounding similar to an explosion or a thunderclap to ...

brought many complaints from the public.

2009 Lightning crash

An English Electric Lightning T5, ZU-BEX, (

No. XS451) crashed while carrying out a display at the biennial

South African Air Force "Through hardships to the stars" , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , anniversaries = , equipment ...

Overberg Airshow held at

AFB Overberg Air Force Base Overberg is an airbase of the South African Air Force at Bredasdorp on the Overberg district of the Western Cape province and is the host of the 525 squadron and the Test Flight and Development Centre. It is placed under command ...

near

Bredasdorp Bredasdorp is a town in the Southern Overberg region of the Western Cape, South Africa, and the main economic and service hub of that region. It lies on the northern edge of the Agulhas Plain, about south-east of Cape Town and north of Cape Agu ...

on 14 November 2009. The aircraft suffered hydraulic failure after a fire started in the rear of the fuselage. The pilot was killed because his ejection seat failed to operate due to the canopy not jettisoning. The accident investigation found major shortcomings in the maintenance program of the aircraft, consequently the South African Civil Aviation Authority suspended the company's operating certificate in March 2010. On 9 September 2010, it was reported that the Thunder City fleet would no longer take paying passengers. On 22 August 2011 three Lightnings, three Buccaneers and four Hunters were listed as "for sale by private treaty" with Go Industry. The closing date for bids was 27 April 2012. The first time Thunder City participated in an airshow since the 2009 crash was on 21 April 2012 at the

airshow.kykNET Overberg Airshow 2012
www.goingairside.com, Retrieved 2013-10-08 A set of Lightning tyres were sold by Thunder City to the

Bloodhound SSC ''Bloodhound LSR'', formerly ''Bloodhound SSC'', is a British land vehicle designed to travel at supersonic speeds with the intention of setting a new world land speed record. The arrow-shaped car, under development since 2008, is powered by a je ...

Project in August 2012.

Notes

References

{{coord, -33.982738, 18.601786, type:landmark_region:ZA, display=title Aviation in South Africa Companies established in 1998 Aerospace companies of South Africa Companies based in Cape Town Defunct companies of South Africa