Red Bull has pushed extreme aviation to a whole new level, executing what it said was the first inverted formation flight through and around the highest railway bridge in Europe.
Earlier this month, the Czech Flying Bulls Aerobatics Team, piloting four XtremeAir XA42s, performed the inverted group loop over the 650-foot-high Mala Rijeka Bridge northeast of Podgorica, Montenegro, near the Albanian border.
The viaduct bridge spans a deep canyon anchored by the Mala Rijeka River and is part of a railway line connecting Belgrade, Serbia, and the Adriatic Sea port town of Bar. The bridge is more than 1,600 feet long and supported by massive concrete pillars, which, according to the team, “presented both psychological and technical challenges.”
The location also offered the ultimate challenge: If something went wrong, there was nowhere to make an emergency landing.
[Credit: Predrag Vuckovic/Red Bull]
“We looked at several bridges in the Czech Republic, but none were suitable due to nearby high-tension wires. Eventually, we found what we needed in Montenegro,” said Red Bull team leader Stanislav Čejka. “The rocky terrain and the fact that a straight approach was only possible from one side made this an exceptionally complex, especially in formation.”
The four team aircraft flew in a tight diamond formation, performing the inverted loop under negative G-force in a “maneuver almost unheard of in such a narrow space,” according to Red Bull.
“This kind of move is rarely done even in open skies,” Čejka said. “To do it in a canyon is something that hasn’t been attempted before.”
It was a maneuver that required an epic level of focus, according to another team member.
“We had to block out everything—the rocks, the bridge—and concentrate solely on following [Čejka’s] lead,” Red Bull pilot Jan Tvrdík said.