Fraser Blues donate their wings

For the ninth year running, the Fraser Blues formation demonstration team caused jaws to drop at this year's Sea Cavalcade.

But this year, there was a difference. The team came to do its air shows out-of-pocket, asking only for their accommodations and meals to be taken care of.

Sea Cavalcade co-chair Barrie Custance said the economic downturn meant the Sea Cavalcade committee didn't have the sponsorship it needed to hire the Blues.

"We put our heads together and counted our pennies and said, 'we just can't afford those guys this year,'" he said.

Custance said the Blues made a counter-offer to come for half their usual fee of about $4,000, but Custance said the money simply wasn't there for it.

"We told them that we don't have a sponsor for them, so they came back again and said, 'We enjoy coming here so much, we're going to come and do it for nothing.' We were ecstatic. It was really something that they would do that for us,for our community."

Fraser Blues team leader George Miller said it was a team decision to come for the event and it was based on Sea Cavalcade being one of their favourite events of the year to fly in.

"We said this is one of the two places of all that we do that we really want to come to, so let's just go do it," he said. "These type of events are the heart of a community. It's really important to keep them as much as possible. We've been coming here for about nine years. We just love it We attend a lot of the big air shows, but we find we don't, as a team, enjoy it nearly as much because it's more fun when you can really connect with the community. You get close to the people."

In part, the team was able to come to the event because of their main sponsor, Petro Value, a jet fuel company that was able to cover much of this season's start up costs.

Through a series of donated meals from local restaurants and accommodation at a local motel, Custance was able to meet the team's request of just having their expenses paid during their weekend visit.

The remaining costs were donated by Prudential Sussex Reality and Custance said there was also one community member, who wishes to remain anonymous, who donated the airplane fuel costs for the Fraser Blues, purely out of a love of seeing them perform every year.

"Of course, the major donation was the Fraser Blues themselves," Cus-tance said.

He said the team's performance this year was the best he had seen and he was thrilled they agreed to do the simulated dive-bombing in Gibsons Harbour, a first for Sea Cav.

He added he hopes to see the Fraser Blues back for Sea Cavalcade on an annual basis.

"They're certainly a great bunch of guys. They really support us and the festival, and they want to come here every year," he said.