THERE will be a new flavour to the Black Cats helicopter display team at this year's Bournemouth Air Festival.

They are the display team of the Royal Navy and are now made up of the Lynx Mk8 that has served it so well and the latest version of their steed, the Wildcat HMA Mk2.

See our gallery of Black Cats images here

It is the newest version of the multi-role helicopter, designed to operate from frigates and destroyers.

Don't think that the helicopters can't match the planes for display excitement.

The display will include all kinds of moves, including formation flying, nose-overs and the carousel. For the nose-over, the helicopter tilts 90 degrees so the nose is facing the ground, while the carousel sees two helicopters bring themselves nose to nose and 'dance' with each other in the air.

The manoeuvres have been linked together to focus on achieving a dynamic, vertical and crowd-centred routine.

The Lynx is used for a variety of roles in and is powered by two Rolls Royce Gem engines, the MK8 variant has a top speed of 174 Kts.

It is used for both search and weapons operations - it can fire up to four anti-ship missiles and take two torpedoes or depth charges.

It can be fitted with machine guns as well.

The Wildcat has a range of 420 nautical miles and a top speed of 157 knots.

Its kit includes forward-firing rockets and machine guns, a mounted machine gun and air-to-surface missile systems.

The display team's aircrew and engineers are volunteers from 702 Naval Air Squadron, based at Royal Naval Air Station at Yeovilton, Somerset.