Japan JASDF Blue Impulse  11 Squadron, Aerobatic Demonstration Team

3rd Generation Blue Impulse Team, flying the Kawasaki T-4 is a subsonic intermediate jet trainer aircraft 

A wonderful collection of the beautiful Japanese Blue Impulse team. Very nicely painted and just snap them together and are ready to perform! The model comes fully pre-painted including Japanese insignia as shown on the photographs. It is fabulously rare for collectors, this series are ideal for wargaming as they can be reainted easily.

Condition: Brand new in plastic package

History:

Blue Impulse, or 11 Squadron, is the aerobatic demonstration team of the Japan Air Self-Defense Force. Originally founded in 1960 as a team of six F-86 Sabres, the team switched to the Mitsubishi T-2 in 1980 and then to the Kawasaki T-4 in 1995. They are based at Matsushima Air Base, which was heavily damaged by a tsunami on March 11, 2011.

The first unofficial Japanese aerobatic team was formed in 1958 at Hamamatsu airbase. The team used F-86F Sabre fighters which did not have a special color scheme. After four demonstrations, the team was disbanded. The next year the USAF Thunderbirds visited Japan, and inspired Japan's Air Self Defense Force (JASDF) commanding officers to establish an official aerobatic team. In 1960 the new team was formed at Hamamatsu airbase flying five F-86F fighters, with three of the pilots coming from Japan's 1958 team.
 
The first demonstration of the new team "Tenryu" (named after a river near the air base), was on March 4, 1960 in Hamamatsu. However this name was hard to pronounce in western languages, so the team was renamed Blue Impulse. The planes were equipped with smoke generators using five different colors for each plane: white, red, blue, green, and yellow. The planes were painted in silver, light blue, blue and pink; on the leader's plane, the blue is replaced by gold. In the next year, all five jets received special demonstration paint schemes of white and blue. In 1964, Blue Impulse performed at the opening of the Olympic Games in Tokyo, drawing the Olympic rings in the air with colored smoke. In 1970, at the opening of Expo '70 in Osaka, the team drew "Expo '70" in the air. In February 1982, after 545 air demonstrations, Blue Impulse stopped using the F-86F Sabre and instead began using Japanese-built Mitsubishi T-2 jets. The first air show with the new planes was on June 25 at the team's new Matsushima airbase.
 
At Expo '90 in Osaka, Blue Impulse performed at the opening event and drew the "Expo '90" logo in the air.
  
The team's last performance with the Mitsubishi T-2 was in December 1995, after 175 demonstrations with these aircraft. The new Blue Impulse aircraft became the Japanese-built Kawasaki T-4 trainer, and the first show with these planes was on April 5, 1996. In 1997, the team made their first foreign debut at the Nellis AFB air show in Nevada, USA. In 1998 Blue Impulse performed at the Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
 
Blue Impulse also performed at the 2002 FIFA World Cup; on June 4, 2002, they performed at the opening of the Japan versus Belgium match.

True details from a plane. True to the color scheme. Collect them all!