Red Arrows fly to Portsmouth for D-Day celebrations

Fans gathered outside Bournemouth Airport to see the world's premier aerobatic flight team leave the airport to fly over Portsmouth's 80th Anniversary D-Day celebrations on June 5 attended by King Charles, prime minister Rishi Sunak, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, and the Prince of Wales. 

Due to leave at 12.17pm, the squad was delayed by a few minutes on its departure and was said to have arrived late over Portsmouth due to fly over the city at 12.31pm. 

The team was scheduled to return to Bournemouth Airport at 12.42pm with childminder Sooz Pitter, 44, telling the Echo she planned to stay all morning with the kids to see the iconic red planes. 

She said: "The children are interested in vehicles and aviation so I saw in the Echo yesterday that the Red Arrows were here so I thought we'd watch them take off. 

"They've been very excited and we came first thing at 9.47am to watch them land and we thought we would stay to watch them take off and land again."

The Red Arrows will fly from Bournemouth Airport once again on June 6 to make their way to Normandy for the official 80th anniversary D-Day memorial event. 

The event is expected to be attended by some of the world's biggest political leaders.

President of the United States, Joe Biden, landed in Paris on June 5 in preparation for the event. 

Visible to Bournemouth residents as they depart at 10.08am, they will later return to the Bournemouth base at 4pm. 

Verwood residents will also be given a chance to catch a glimpse of the jets as they depart from Bournemouth Airport on June 7 to RAF Valley.

There will be one final chance on June 8 when the planes set off for Portsmouth AFD display at 3.19 pm before once again returning to Bournemouth at 4.05pm.

This may be one of the few opportunities to see the Red Arrows in Bournemouth after it was confirmed in November the planes will not return this summer for the Bournemouth Air Festival.