Officials with the Fargo AirSho announced today that this year's AirSho has been canceled.
Dick Walstad co-chairs the Fargo AirSho and says it was a tough decision, but with the Blue Angels grounded due to the government sequester, holding an AirSho would not have been a wise move financially.
"They're a big draw at the Fargo AirSho, so we spent two weeks here doing a lot of meetings, financial protections, things of that sort, trying to figure out, could we do a show without the Blue Angels? And we just came to the conclusion it just wasn't going to work unless we wanted to lose some money, and we're not in a position to want to lose some money. That didn't leave much of an alternative, so we just decided we were going to have to cancel the show for 2013."
Walstad says the reluctant decision does not mean future shows are in jeopardy. He says each of the 70 AirSho committee members unanimously agree that in the coming years, the show will go on.
"We'll be back, the Fargo AirSho will be back," Walstad says. "We're already talking about a show for 2014, 2015, one of those two years, perhaps both those two years. The application process is such that that may happen. But of course, sequestration has to come to an end first. We have to get our military back to functioning and all these show teams back to flying. So that's the big thing. We really thought it was going to be over by now but it isn't unfortunately, and because of that, both the US Air Force Thunderbirds and the Navy Blue Angels have been grounded."
Walstead says the AirSho takes place every other year, and that net proceeds from previous shows have been donated to non-profits in the region including the Fargo Air Museum.