Southport Air Show — Local services in Sefton

The most poorly organised event I've ever been to.

Once we hit Southport we queued for over an hour to get on to a car park. No staff in sight to advise how long it was taking/cost/if there were actually any spaces left. Once we reached the carpark we were met by a sign advising us to "have payment ready" it's a shame the people taking the payment weren't ready for the 21st century. Not knowing how to operate a card machine holding it long enough to accept payment from the card! 2 people were taking payment, no wonder the queue took so long. What an absolute joke. Why not offer a parking pass when purchasing tickets online. Saving time (& money btw on staff that are not needed and don't know how to do the job!)

We finally park up and head down to show our tickets, which then couldn't be scanned as the scanner was having trouble reading the barcode due to the glare on the screen! 🙄 The guy gave up in the end and let us through anyway.

Having been in the car so long we now need the toilet but good luck finding anything as there are no signs, staff or anything and just a prominade so full of people that you can barely move. So of course we have to walk up and down until we eventually find 2 blocks of 2/3 toilets per sex (good luck if you want to change your baby! They hadn't thought about that!)

We then go to get food and drink. Pay £6 for a pint warmer than a Luke warm bath and give up on food as did a lot of other people after been stood there for a good 45 minutes

We then decide to head down onto the beach. Which was a problem as the only way to get the pram down was lift it over a high wall or carry it up and down steps. So they haven't bothered to think about disabled or Pram access (which I'm pretty sure is a legal h&s requirement)

Once on the beach where our 15month old could play we then stood in another queue for 2 hours to get some food before deciding to leave early so we weren't stuck in yet another queue.

We appreciate these events come with queues but having been to Glastonbury festival 2 weeks ago getting on and off the carpark in less than 20 minutes and not queuing longer than 5 for food or 10 for beer this is absolutely ridiculous. I can not comprehend why this was so poorly organised. I've genuinely never seen anything like it

The actual airshow and planes were fantastic it's just shame that whoever arranges or plans this has absolutely zero event planning experience. I genuinely think a class of primary school children would have done...

Southport Air Show: Launching on Friday 6th September, Southport is ready for a weekend of aviation fun with the annual Southport Air Show. Grab the family and make your way down to Southport beach for an amazing family weekend.

We have put together 10 things to do whilst you are here...

If you have never been to the Friday of the Southport Air Show you are in for a treat. The atmosphere is very different to the rest of the weekend. You will see pyros on planes, men parachuting with flames on their feet, lasers across the sky and a huge FIREWORK FINALE!

The Royal Navy and Royal Marines, British Army and the Royal Air Force are based there and will have plenty of equipment for you to look at plus they have a Royal Marine demonstrating a diving tank!

Watch out for beach explosions!

With some of the flying displays we re-enact a dog fight and blow the beach up with pyros!. We will announce the displays that have the explosions the week of the air show and publish the details on the Flying Times section.

Hear the 69th Field Artillery Guns

Firing throughout the Southport Air Show – they will sound amazing! Watch out for them, they will create an amazing atmosphere!

Enjoy FAST JETS!

Enjoy displays from Swedish Air Force Historic Flight Saab Viggen and Saab Tunnan as they display for the first time in Southport. Also enjoy the Norwegian Air Force Historical Flight T-33 Shooting Star for the first time in Southport!

Head over to the beach

There the are lots of attractions incluging a paintball range and mini tanks! You can have plenty of fun before the displays start!

Enjoy the air show in a totally different way - from the Pier!

If you upgrade your tickets to Lancaster Lounge tickets you can enjoy food, a hosted marquee, private toilets and you can watch the Air Show from the Pier. Plus you may even meet a pilot or two! Tickets for the Lancaster Lounge can be bought. Good Luck...

THE TRUTH = TOTALLY PATHETIC! We have been attending Southport airshow for 10 years consistently. For the last few years (except covid), this event has, year by year, just like the planes, nose dived! Last year was poor and thousands complained, but as a family, due to its historical performance, we gave Southport one last chance to redeem itself. Sadly, it didn't and then some. The RED ARROWS, the item that basically everyone turns up for, cancelled, with the lame excuse of the runway being to wet to land on following any display. Sorry, but these are advanced training aircraft with some of the world's best pilots inside them and they can't land on a wet or damp runway ? Total horse sh!t. I've witnessed them land in much worse. When other varied planes were managing to turn up in what was a sunny sky, but the crown jewel of the display couldn't 🤷‍♂️ Massive disappointment. The ques to enter were huge, the food stalls massively over priced and poor quality, the items the raf, army and navy had brought to walk around have got much less and much more poor year after year. Half of the advertised planes to display didn't turn up, extremely large time gaps between planes displaying, leaving people with nothing to do for sometimes 90 minutes in-between certain displays, a loud speaker system for talking and describing the displays for the audience that was crackling and distorted sound so was very hard to make out, hardly any stewards or police present to help patrol the event or keep things in order, the beach is an oil ridden mud fest, which is not walkable unless you've come in your hiking gear and want to spend the day covered in it. It's very sad to say this after our years of attending and loyalty to Southport airshow, but we WILL NOT be returning again and will now search out alternatives. ...