If you’ve been living vicariously through Top Gun over the years, chances are the air show at Barksdale is your favorite local attraction for the most tangential experience you can get of going Mach 2 with your hair on fire. Officially called the Defenders of Liberty Air Show, Barksdale’s air show has been a staple in the community since 1933. Barksdale’s air show is unique in that it showcases not only military aircraft, but civilian performers as well; normally, air shows at other locations around the country are either exclusively military-run (meaning DOD), or exclusively civilian performers and their aircraft. Barksdale’s air show gives us the best of both worlds.
Far from being just a local institution, Barksdale Air Force Base is a pivotal Air Force base not only for U.S. security but international as well. At just under 30,000 acres, Barksdale is the secondlargest base in the U.S. Air Force. In addition to its sheer size, the base is also home to the world’s largest and oldest bomb wing…the 2nd Bomb Wing. Yes, you read that right… the world’s largest and oldest bomb wing, and according to the man who runs it all, 2nd Bomb Wing Commander Colonel Michael Maginness, America is the only free nation in the world that maintains a bomber force. While the 2nd Bomb Wing’s origins date back to 1918 in France during World War I, Barksdale was dedicated on February 2, 1933 as Barksdale Field (later renamed Barksdale Air Force Base in 1948 after the Army Air Corps was separated from the U.S. Army to create its own branch, the U.S. Air Force), and was named after Eugene Barksdale, a World War I aviator who died in a test flight in Ohio in 1926.
Considering the exclusivity of Barksdale’s mission, the world has relied on us for bombing power. During World War II, Barksdale served as a training base. In the Vietnam era, B-52s deployed from 1965 through 1972, playing a major role in the Linebacker I and II campaigns that preempted the end of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war. In the early 90s, Barksdale flew missions (referred to as “sorties” in the military) in support of Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm, including the very first combat sortie of Operation Desert Storm (a sortie that was 35 hours, the longest in U.S. military history at the time). Not long after these conflicts, the 2nd Bomb Wing name was adopted on October 1, 1993, after the arrival of KC-135 Stratotankers and KC-10s. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the 2nd Bomb Wing was called upon to spearhead the “War on Terror,” dropping the first bombs in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and flying over 150 combat sorties in Operation Iraqi Freedom (and locals will remember that President George W. Bush landed at Barksdale that day as a safe haven after leaving a school in Florida where he had been). The 2nd Bomb Wing also played a pivotal role as recently as Operation Inherent Resolve, and today, Colonel Maginness insists they can “hold almost any target at risk anywhere in the world within 18 hours.” The B-52 (which Colonel Maginness calls “the greatest aircraft ever made in the history of the world”) is obviously Barksdale’s bread and butter that we have been utilizing all these decades. Production began on the B-52 at Boeing’s Wichita, Kansas plant in 1952 (thus the “52” designation) and was produced through 1962. A total of 744 were built. Only 76 are left, with the majority at Barksdale and another squadron at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota under the 5th Bomb Wing. These thoroughbreds aren’t going anywhere anytime soon, though: the Colonel says they “will easily stay at the frontline of warfare well past 2050.” The Air Force equivalent school to the Navy’s Top Gun is called the “U.S. Air Force Weapons School,” headquartered at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas, Nevada, (Colonel Maginness himself was a graduate and instructor at the school), and the B-52 division of that school is right here at Barksdale.
Which brings us to this year’s show. The show will take place on March 29th and 30th, a Saturday and Sunday, admission and parking are free, and gates will open at 9 a.m. Some things have remained the same, but some things are new this year; there will be some familiar performers, as well as new ones, but Colonel Maginness wants to remain coy on some surprises, as well as the man helping organize the show on the Barksdale side of things, Captain Miller Trant (call sign “Gator”). Both B-52 pilots, the two are clearly enthused about the air show and couldn’t be more pleased or grateful at the public’s support and the chance to give back to the local community. “We are really excited here at the 2nd Bomb Wing and Barksdale Air Force Base to host this for Bossier, Shreveport, and really the northwest Louisiana Ark-La-Tex area. Barksdale…quite frankly, it’s a national treasure. We are honored to be the host installation for Air Force Global Strike Command. Pretty much the entire U.S. Air Force portfolio of the nuclear triad, as well as a significant portion of nuclear command and control is headquartered or managed in some form or fashion here at Barksdale. So, with that, we have a great story to tell, and we love this opportunity to showcase it to our outstanding mission partners in Shreveport and Bossier, because really one of the secrets that makes this base work is just the incredible community partnerships that we have” says Colonel Maginness. He further calls the air show an “investment in our future…I can guarantee you people will join the Air Force in their future based on what they see during the Defenders of Liberty Air Show.” Maginness himself decided as an elementary school child to join the Air Force one day when he sat in the cockpit of an F4 Phantom for five minutes. “That’s the type of return on investment that we see from these air shows,” he confirms. Recruiting is actually the Department of Defense’s primary goal behind air shows, and to a potential Air Force recruit, Maginness says, “It’s worth it.” The Thunderbirds will be buzzing the tower at this year’s show. If you’ve ever wondered why some performers come some years but not others, Captain Trant explains: “It’s all done by the ACC (Air Combat Command)…
Thunderbirds are part of ACC, it’s just a matter of their scheduling that they go through, their scheduling process to allocate those different demo teams to air shows all over the world, not just the U.S.” Furthermore, an organization called the International Council of Air Shows (ICAS) holds a conference in Las Vegas every year, which Captain Trant attended last December, and “that’s really where a lot of the demo teams, including Thunderbirds, Blue Angels and all the single-ship demo teams, get awarded, and we find out there. I was sitting in the seats…finding out what demo teams, if we were getting the Golden Knights or not, and we were awarded the Golden Knights… it’s a great experience and it’s just all run through that conference there. It’s random as far as I know, and it’s based off of who applies for them, and where they rack and stack that list all up at a much higher level than we’re at right now.” On a positive note for us, Captain Trant says, “I will say, every single person I have talked to, whether it be performer or static, they have said that their favorite air show has been Barksdale, and they all want to come back.” Colonel Maginness piggybacked on that and said, “We have multiple performers that have chosen to come here instead of going to a beautiful island in Florida,” referencing an air show in Key West at a similar time. Captain Trant is working with a team to help organize the show that includes the Shreveport Bossier Military Affairs Council (or MAC for short) on the civilian side. The MAC is a local civilian advocacy group that works to serve as the primary liaison between the Barksdale and civilian communities. Their president, Trey Giglio, had this to say about the air show: “The MAC is excited to partner with Barksdale Air Force Base once again to produce the Defenders of Liberty Air Show. This event is a great recruitment tool for the Air Force and for our region. We are excited to showcase everything Barksdale offers from national security to a $1 billion annual economic impact on our region. We look forward to hosting nearly 200,000 visitors to our area for air show weekend to stay in our hotels and dine in our restaurants. This is a great opportunity for the Shreveport-Bossier community.”
Colonel Maginness says, “This is going to be an outstanding air show. It’s going to be different than any we’ve ever done here before. We’re going to keep some surprises in our hip pocket.” While the Thunderbirds do headline the show, other military demos include the C-17, the KC-135 and KC-46, with the KC-46 demo being the first ever demonstration of the KC-46 in history. Officially titled the Boeing KC-46 Pegasus, the KC-46 is replacing the KC-135 Stratotanker as the Air Force’s primary refueling aircraft of choice and was only introduced into service in the Air Force in 2019. As far as civilian performers, Captain Trant says, “We’ve got the Red Bull Air Force…so we’ve got Kevin Coleman (a Louisiana Tech graduate) and his Extra 300, we have Aaron Fitzgerald with his helicopter that…does stuff a helicopter should not be able to do. We have the Red Bull jump team with them. We’ve got GhostWriter Nathan Hammond (not to be confused with “Ghostrider,” whose pattern was full), he does a really cool pyro show where he has fireworks literally attached to his airplane and he’ll shoot them off while he’s flying. We’ve got the Army Flying Museum, with a swathe of different Vietnam era paint jobs on their helicopters. They do a demo, kind of Vietnam era, with a bunch of other statics and performers.” Mr. Randy Ball, who flies a Mig-17, will also be back, but he’s one of the attractions the Colonel remains reticent on because it involves another first ever feat for an air show.
The air show isn’t just a refreshing slice of Americana, but also an economic boon to our area. Attendance is regularly between the 150,000-200,000 mark over the course of the show, with many attendees coming from out of town and even out of state. Numbers for the 2023 air show estimate a $9.6 million overall economic impact to the area, with the first day of the show showing the 11th highest hotel occupancy rating of that year. Visitor spending grew overall by 9% that weekend, and visitors from New Orleans (who has an annual air show at NASJRB, or Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans) increased by over 50% (likewise in 2024), and visitors from Little Rock by 33%. Outdoor recreation spending shows the biggest increase of all categories for the area at 176%, and other categories show increases as well, including a 14% increase for retail in the area. Data shows the bulk of visitors visit the East Bank in Bossier, the Southern Loop and Provenance areas, and the rural areas surrounding south Bossier. According to some outside visitors, the novelty of a bomber base air show is what convinces them to make the trek. Los Angeles has “Tinseltown,” Vegas has gambling, New Orleans has Mardi Gras…we’ve got bombs.
So whether you’ve got thirty plus years of service with combat medals and citations, or you’ve never been to an air show, come out to support your men and women in uniform and see the best of what your taxpayer dollars fund. Our local base has played a larger role in U.S. military history than most of us know, and it is a base to be proud of. Entire nations have depended on what Barksdale has to offer, and we can be proud of our contribution to America’s military might.
By Kevin Hinson
Photography courtesy of U.S. Department of Defense-DVIDS
