Team Breitling Wing-Walkers
The internationally famous and only European team of wing-walkers, ‘Team Breitling’, will this year be appearing over Windermere, with an exciting new routine for 2010. The Breitling Wingwalkers will take to the skies performing a breathtaking sequence of formation loops and rolls, while daring wingwalkers performing acrobatics on the wings.
Standing on the wing of the Stearman biplanes, the glamorous wing-walkers brave speeds of up to 150mph in a series of loops, rolls and roller-coaster manoeuvres.
Who were the first Wing-Walkers?
Wing-walking began during the First World War when Ormer Locklear, during his pilot training with the Army Air Servicies, regularly climbed onto the lower wing of his biplane to effect mechanical repairs. A few years later, this activity was further developed by the Army Air Corps as a method of air-to-air refueling. A wing-walker, with a fuel tank strapped to his back, would transfer from one plane to another.
The Stearman Model 75 Biplane
The Stearman (Boeing) Model 75 biplane was built in the United States, during the 1930's and 1940's, as a military trainer aircraft. After the Second World War, thousands of these surplus aircraft were sold on the civil market. In the immediate post-war years they became popular as crop dusters and as sports planes.
