Heavy traffic on Meadowbrook State Parkway as people exit Jones Beach following the cancellation of the Bethpage Air Show on Saturday. Credit: Debbie Egan-Chin

Hundreds of people streamed off Jones Beach early Saturday afternoon, after organizers of the Bethpage Air Show ordered the beach evacuated and remaining performances canceled because of the approach of heavy rain and lighting.

Low cloud cover had initially caused a delay in the show Saturday morning, but organizers were able to fit a few flights in before the total cancellation. Last year, the Saturday air show was completely canceled because of rain.

Some beachgoers took the cancelation in stride and said they would consider coming back Sunday, when the air show is expected to continue.

"It's disappointing, but it was still fun. We still got to see the Skytypers and F35s if just for a short time," said Joseph Carbone, 40, of Wading River. "It's nice they gave us notice, but maybe they could have announced it a little sooner."

After several flights were canceled or delayed, an F35C fighter jet began circling the boardwalk over Jones Beach Tower shortly before noon, eliciting a long-awaited round of applause from the crowd on the beach.

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The jet, the first to perform Saturday, circled the beach, flipped upside down, and made several passes over the water, roaring its burners, as it made several low passes and flipped into the sky.  

By then, about half the clouds had parted to make way for blue skies.

After the F35C jets, the Geico Skytypers performed their stunt formations, painting the sky with their exhaust trails. The five planes passed each other head-on, weaving back and forth before splitting apart and twisting a trail of smoke in their path.

The Skytypers then painted a heart over the newly-uncovered blue sky and performed stunts to Ray Charles' America the Beautiful.

Until the cancellation, which was announced shortly before 1 p.m., the rest of the show was planned to resume through the afternoon, with organizers planning a jump from the U.S. Army Golden Knights parachuters — which had originally been scheduled for the planned 10 a.m. start of the show — along with other flights. The plan was to culminate with the Blue Angels.

The first performance of the day was by a U.S. Coast Guard rescue team, with a Coast Guard helicopter flying over the Jones Beach Tower, because it did not have cloud limitations.

The chopper and a four-man crew hovered about 10 feet above the water, simulating a marine water rescue. The helicopter lowered a rescue swimmer into the water

Announcers said it was a simulation of the type of stormy weather that Coast Guard officers perform rescues in, like the weather that canceled all but one day of last year's air show.

The air show had been scheduled to return at full capacity Saturday, after being hampered by rain and COVID-19 restrictions the past two years.

Light rain had been falling less than an hour before the scheduled start of the show, but it had stopped by 10 a.m.

But while there were three miles of horizontal visibility Saturday morning, which the Federal Aviation Administration requires, there was not a 1,000-foot cloud ceiling, announcers said.

Performers like the U.S. Army's Golden Knights need 2,000 feet visibility to jump.

Dense fog and low clouds limited visibility and kept attractions like the Blue Angels from taking to the skies during Friday’s planned practice as well.

National Weather Service representatives were on the boardwalk Saturday to advise of any dangerous or severe weather conditions.

"If we do have a threat of lightning, then we will close down the show," State Parks Regional Director George Gorman said earlier Saturday, before the cancellation was announced. "We will evacuate everyone off of the beaches so that we keep everybody as safe as we possible."

Even with the light rain and cool breeze before the show began, beachgoers streamed onto Jones Beach awaiting the start of the show.

A steady but smaller crowd than expected dragged coolers and carried beach chairs and umbrellas across the boardwalk.

Crowds at the air show have in the past topped 150,000 people per day. Gorman predicted a weather-dampened crowd of about 50,000 Saturday, with up to 150,000 people possible on Sunday, when sunny skies are forecast.

At about 11:40 a.m., Nassau police said there were no traffic backups reported near Jones Beach. Most parking fields had many empty spaces throughout the morning.

Kahlel Robinson and Alex Cruz, both of Valley Stream, came to see the real thing after watching fighter jets in the new movie, Top Gun: Maverick.

"I'm really excited to see these planes for the first time," Robinson said. "I think everyone should see what it's like for pilots to fly the real planes."

Robinson and Cruz spoke before the show started, and hoped the sun would burn off some clouds as it tried to peek through gray skies. They brought an umbrella in case of rain.

"I haven’t been to an air show in years, since I was a kid. It's slightly disappointing," Cruz said of the early cancellations. "I was looking forward to seeing it all, but the show must go on."

Vicky Okolski and her family, who are from Franklin Square, said they were not going to let the threat of rain stop a visit they have been planning for the past few years.

"We were trying to get here a couple years and planned to make it no matter what," she said. "Not unless there was a tornado, we were coming."

The weather had already improved since early morning, when the beach and the Jones Beach tower were fogged in.

Okolski and her 3-year-old grandson, Andrew, said they were looking forward to the Blue Angels.

"We're hoping the storms hold out until this afternoon. We're having a good time anyway," Okolski said. "Everyone seems very happy. It's just a beautiful place to be today."

The air show kicks off Long Island’s tourism season, which the organization Discover Long Island estimates draws $6.3 billion annually across the Island through the summer.

The 2020 show was canceled, and after last year’s Saturday show was rained out, organizers took the unprecedented step of hosting performers from around the country on the following Monday.

This year's show marks the return of the Blue Angels, who last performed in the show in 2018. 

John Asbury covers the Town of Hempstead and the City of Long Beach. He has been with Newsday since 2014 and previously covered crime for nine years for The Press-Enterprise in Southern California. David Olson covers health care. He has worked at Newsday since 2015 and also previously worked at The Press-Enterprise.

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