Red Arrows to fly over London on Saturday

If you’re in central London at lunchtime, look to the skies for a large military aircraft flypast including the Red Arrows. It’s the traditional conclusion of the Trooping the Colour, the King’s official birthday parade and will fly over central London a little before 1pm on Saturday 17th June 2023.

The flypast will assemble over Norfolk and Kent and then they line up for a straight run over east London towards Buckingham Palace and then disperse in three directions over west London.

To watch the flypast — the best spot along The Mall, but that’s also usually packed full of people who are attending the parade, so there are plenty of other places to watch the flypast.

It’s visible for some distance on either side and so long as you can see a lot of the sky without buildings in the way, you’re likely to be fine. Ideal locations would include the south bank and the bridges over the Thames.

You can see the flypast from the Olympic Park in Stratford, and the flypast will likely be over the northern end of the park – so be near the Olympic Rings for a good view.

The helicopters will fly over first, followed by a gap, then the faster planes, then a gap to allow for the fighter jets, and finally the Red Arrows.

Note — the Red Arrows usually don’t turn on their coloured smokes until they’re closer to the City, so if you want to see the red white and blue, then central London viewing spots will be best.

The order of the flypast is expected to be:

• 3 Juno helicopters
• 3 Wildcat Merlin Mk 2 helicopters
• 5 Wildcat Apace helicopters
• 3 Wildcat Merlin Mk4 helicopters
• 4 Chinook Puma helicopters
• Lancaster bomber flanked by Spitfire and Hurricane planes
• Phenom and Texan turboprop training planes
• 3 C130-J Hercules planes
• 1 Globemaster C-17 heavy lift transport plane
• 1 Voyager A400M – an air-to-air refueling tanker
• 1 Poseidon Typhoon – marine patrol aircraft
• 6 F-35B Lighting fighter jets
• 9 Typhoon fighter jets
• The Red Arrows

(c) RAF