BRUNSWICK – Navy officials predict as many as 100,000 people will visit Brunswick Naval Air Station for each day of this weekend’s air show, the first in six years and probably the last.
The Navy’s Blue Angels are scheduled to headline the event, which is also to feature nine other air acts, 25 display aircraft and dozens of vendors.
The gates open at 8 a.m. and the flying performances begin at 10 a.m.
If the weather’s good, officials expect Brunswick to become Maine’s largest city for several hours each day.
On Saturday, the event is expected to draw additional people to a planned peace protest, beginning in the downtown and ending outside the base’s main gate, several miles away.
Protester Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a U.S. soldier who died in Iraq, was expected to attend the march but canceled last week. Kathy Kelly of Voices in the Wilderness is still scheduled to address the crowd, which is to include members of Maine Veterans for Peace, Pax Christi Maine and Peace Action Maine among others.
Virtually every officer in the Brunswick Police Department is expected to work during all or part of the weekend, Chief Jerry Hinton said.
“It will be slow going,” he said. And if people want to reach the base before the afternoon performance of the Blue Angels, they need to leave as early as possible, he said.
“If you wait too long, you’re taking a chance of never finding a parking place,” he said.
The base plans to open all three gates to the public. People are encouraged to avoid the main gate, located on the Bath Road near Cook’s Corner, and take one of the other two. One is located on Route 123, about one and a half miles from Bowdoin College on the Harpswell Road. The other alternate gate is located off Route 24, just south of Cook’s Corner.
Police will be at each gate and a variety of other busy intersections throughout the town, Hinton said.
Meanwhile the base is encouraging alternate transportation. The Maine Eastern Railroad has organized two special trains to bring people to the shows from Rockland, with stops in Wiscasset, Bath and downtown Brunswick.
The train will also include a special car for people’s bicycles, something encouraged by the base.
“There will be times when that’s the fastest way to get around,” base spokesman John James said.
Security around the base perimeter will be lowered so people can lock their bikes to any chain link fence.
Security will still be tight in many places, though.
Everyone will be subject to screening and all bags will be searched, James said.
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