Smog-Filled Skies Mar China’s Glitzy Air Show Opening With Its Fighters

• China’s hyped air show kicked off with performances from its aerobatics team on Tuesday.
• But the grand display was dampened by smog filling the skies over Zhuhai, Guangdong.
• The hazy opening comes as China tries to shed the reputation of its cities being heavily polluted.

China’s biggest air exhibition opened on Tuesday to smoggy skies obscuring an intricate aerobatics performance meant to display the country’s aircraft to the world.

The Bayi aerobatics team, a People’s Liberation Army Air Force team that flies J-10 fighters, took off just after 10 a.m. local time in Zhuhai, Guangdong, where the China Airshow 2024 is being held.

But as crowds gathered on the tarmac to watch, low visibility made it difficult to make out the fighters and their colored smoke trails.

At times, the J-10s’ shapes could barely be seen as they tore through the murky skies.

According to Accuweather, air quality in Zhuhai that morning was “poor” — which indicates a high level of pollution — as the city experienced higher levels of nitrogen dioxide.

Poor weather continued to conceal aircraft flypasts an hour after the event opened, muddying displays from China’s 150-foot-long YY-20 jet refueler and its Red Falcon team, which flies the Hongdu JL-8 fighter.

In contrast, footage of rehearsals shows that the skies were far clearer in the days before the airshow…