Going to Albania

By
Peter Prevec
– 2011/03/13Posted in: on the set

I’m off to Albania to shot another Red Bull event. This time is BO 105 show in Tirana. It is a acrobatic helicopter show. There are only 4 helicopters in the world that are allowed to do acrobatic flights. Two in USA and two in Austria. Tomorrow it national holiday (Summer Day) in Albania. The Summer Day symbolizes the awakening from the winter sleep. And I guess a perfect day for a show.

The day for us started at the airport. I almost reached the baggage weight limit carrying two tripods, Canon 7D, follow focus and hand held shoulder rig.

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20kg is allowed without additional payment.

My ticket was upgraded to business at the arrival. They said that economy class is full. I later found out that they had to transport some people in police custody and they probably didn’t want to give them business, so a few of us were upgraded.

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Upgraded to business.

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Boarding for Tirana

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Police escort

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Take off

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Reas meal in business class. We even got metal cutlery.

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Border between business and economy.

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Snow and sea

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Clowds over Albania

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Tirana Airport

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On the way to the hotel.

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In front of the hotel.

First we went to hotel. And then to see locations.

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Domen and Martin found long lost twin brothers in Tirana.

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Location scouting

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Cotton candy

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Waiting for the pilots to arrive at the location (Martin, Samo, Domen, Isida, Ledia, Erjol).

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The Flying Bulls insignia

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Carnival

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What is the time?

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Pilots arrived (Endri, Erjol, Siegfried "Blackie" Schwarz, Ledia, Reiner Wilke, Isida, Samo, Martin, Domen).

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Second location (Mother Teresa square) in front of Academy

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Police motorcycle

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Really fast food

After checking the locations we went to dinner. They really like to take us to eat sea food every time. Albanian hospitality is the best.

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This is the guy from previous picture.

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Delicious

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Evening meeting. New member on the right - Albert Xhafaj, Chief of the Medical Transport unit with Helicopter.

Later we found out that we got another helicopter to shoot from and we met with the albanian pilot to coordinate the workflow. Me and Samo will be flying with him. It’s good that we expected to have two helicopters and I brought with me improvised rig for dampening the vibrations of the helicopter.

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My room.

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Canon EOS 7D, Manfroto Hi-Hat, and half empty football

My attempt to make a helicopter rig to dampen the vibrations. Manfrotto Hi-Hat on a half empty football. I really hope that the footage won’t look like jelly too much.

More at some later point in time.

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