San Diego
More than 1 million people--a record--witnessed the weekend’s air show at Miramar Naval Air Station, Navy officials said.
An estimated 400,000 attended the event both Saturday and Sunday, and the show concluded without incident, said Bobbie Carleton, Miramar’s chief of public affairs.
Carleton said 62,400 vehicles were counted coming into the facility on Sunday, with 59,963 counted Saturday. In the past, the show had drawn as many as 750,000 spectators, she said.
An estimated 130,000 people saw a “dress rehearsal” for the show Friday, “and, we had a phenomenal number of pedestrians and bicyclists,” she said.
“There was no way of counting everybody, but those are our estimates, and we definitely believe we passed the 1 million mark.”
Navy officials attributed the record attendance to the military’s success in the Persian Gulf War and to what Carleton called the “continued growth boom” in San Diego County.
This year’s show featured the Navy’s Blue Angels aerobatic flight team, Navy SEAL parachute demonstrations, an Iraqi Scud missile, a Patriot missile battery and more than 100 civilian and military aircraft.
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