The Shadowfest 2023 at New Farm, Piddington was to celebrate the 40 years of the aircrafts' design, a design that was created by David Cook and has achieved many records and achievements as well as a huge following around the world. David was the main focus of the event and although I wasn't able to interview him directly, I was able to speak to Jacob. As you'll see in the video, production aircraft number 1 ( Serial number 002) and the famous Farnborough demonstrator were both present at New Farm. It was a shame the weather wasn't playing ball as it was very wet and windy but with some last minute changes, it was shifted inside.

I made this video more for the Cook family to mark and celebrate the event and at least a record for time.

I would like to thank Courtney Chambers and Tony Brairs

Here are some CFM Shadow facts :

First flown in 1983
Numbers produced : around 450

Numbers believed to still be flying worldwide 350 plus

In 1987 Eve Jackson flew a shadow from the U.K. to Australia

In 1988 Brian Milton did the same journey from the U.K. to Australia in an aircraft called the Dalgety flyer (sponsored by Dalgety animal feeds ) .

A later flight of a Shadow flew from the U.K. to Beijing .

In 1983/84 the shadow set an FAI world class record for speed and range over a 3km
course .

In 1990 , the Shadow set a U.K. class altitude record of 23,648ft ( 7208m )

In 1990 a Streak Shadow flown by David Cook set a new altitude record of 27,066 ft ( 8250m ) .

It has featured in two movies . Dragonheart in 1995 as the viewpoint for the dragon and more actively in the scifi film Slipstream in which it was flown by David Cook . The film featured a young Mark Hamil of Starwars fame .

The design won David Cook a number of awards during its manufacture and used state of the art materials at the time .

40 years later it still provides countless pilots with affordable , fun flying and with the hundreds of enthusiasts , parts producers and the owners club , we should be able to keep them flying for another 40 years !!

David Cook is now 83 and still takes a keen interest in the aircraft he created along with his son Jake and have been so supportive to both New Farm Airfield and then for the past 5 years or so after I relaunched the original owners club . Long May that continue .