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Close encounters with cool planes


vanir

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Maybe I should set up some barbed wire? Land Mines? I got the works!

 

I think there were several other people who saw the chopper, too. Perhaps the Secret Service doesn't mind us seeing the unseen, well, let's just hope...:D

 

And how do you know how to escape, have you, uh, done some thins of questionable legality?

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Nope... I was referring to this version.

 

The 47 is nice but the 37 is much cooler to me.

 

The XB-70 Valkyrie... coolest bomber ever made![/Quote]

 

Eh... I'm not a (big) fan of the Su-37 -looks wise- but the Valkyrie... Yes, that is the coolest bomber. I mean, when this thing can go along a super-sonic speeds to drop a nuke... you know that it's gonna be cool!

 

Oh well...

 

Though, a Su-37 or a F-14... which is cooler.

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Eh... I'm not a (big) fan of the Su-37 -looks wise- but the Valkyrie... Yes, that is the coolest bomber. I mean, when this thing can go along a super-sonic speeds to drop a nuke... you know that it's gonna be cool!

 

Oh well...

 

Though, a Su-37 or a F-14... which is cooler.

I'm not a very big fan of the Su-37 either. It is okay, I guess that I am just a bigger fan of the F-22. Seeing it first hand to about 20% of it's capabilities is amazing--one of the best demos that I have ever seen. It does kinda look like the F-15 on steriods, but I still think that they are both pretty cool. ;) I do think that the Su-37 looks better than the F-14 though.... :xp:

 

The Su-47 is an awesome. I think that a really good thing to do would be to put some forward swept wings on an F-22--that would just add to it's technology, performance, ect. I cannot wait to see what aviation will be like in the next 20 years.

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To me, the F-14 Tomcat is an aeronautic tragedy. It never really got a fair shake. The early models were plagued with terrible engines and by the time that was rectified the design was nearly 20 years old. Even then I believe that it would have served the Navy better as the basis for the "jack-of-all-trades" aircraft position that has been filled by the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet without having to be completely redesigned like the Hornet was.

 

For those that don't know, the F/A-18E/F replaced two very different aircraft, the A-6 (strike)/EA-6 (electronic warfare)/KA-6 (tanker) Intruder and the F-14 (fleet defense) that were each specifically designed for their respective roles. In order to do so the Hornet was almost completely redesigned and enlarged, but it still fails to possess some of the capabilities of the aircraft it replaces. One of its most obvious shortcomings is a reduced combat radius of action in the strike role. In my opinion, the F-14 design inherently possessed greater capabilities and more flexibility that would have allowed it to fill all of these roles admirably without a major redesign. One of the biggest reasons for this belief is the F-14's variable geometry, the "swing-wing," which allows it to operate at optimum efficiency and effectiveness at a variety of weights and airspeeds.

 

Both of the retired aircraft, the A-6 and the F-14, were produced by Grumman, one of my favorite aircraft companies, and the decision broke Grumman's back and lead to its being aquired by Northrop. Who's to blame for this travesty? Why, everyone's favorite vice-president, Dick Cheney, who made the decision way back when he was Secretary of Defense. He even went so far as to force Grumman to destroy their factory tooling used to produce the F-14 in order to eliminate the possibility of its ever being produced again.

 

So, chances are that I've hated Dick Cheney for far longer than anyone else here. :swear:

 

For anyone that's interested: I've found this site to be a very informative and handy quick-reference guide to a variety of military aircraft dating back to World War II.

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Well, I don't know about fighters, but my grandfather flew P-38 reconnaissance aircraft in WWII. He was an active stunt pilot up until a couple years ago, I will try to get some pictures of his plane and him flying it before he sold it. He builds kit planes as a hobby and lets me fly them once he gets the plane in the air--it's a ton of fun! I'm flying down to visit over break, I will get pictures if anyone is interested.

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^^^

Count me as interested. Kit planes are super cool. :)

 

Lockheed really cut its teeth with the P-38 in the field of airborne photoreconnaisance. The P-38 could be considered the ancestor of both the U-2 and the SR-71. A lot of those types of missions were done at very low level and at very high speed and were probably some of the most dangerous missions that a pilot could fly at the time.

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The new Martin-Lockheed F35 STOVLs that are replacing all the British navy's Sea Harriers look super damm cool also. Witnessed a takeoff and landing whilst on a visit to HMS Invincble and it *almost* made me wanna be a flyboy instead.

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  • 3 weeks later...

At the first airshow I went, as a boy, they had a SR-72 Blackbird flying demo. It did an emergency simulation where one engine would go idle and the other to full afterburner to compensate. I also got to see this beauty F 16.

 

One of the most amazing thing I have ever seen was the helicopter demo team of the UK Army Air Corps, the "Blue Eagles". They fly in 4 Gazelles and one Lynx, and when the latter began doing loopings, barrel rolls and backflips my jaw just dropped to the floor. Until then I did't even know a helicopter could do that

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I was flying a little rinky-dink C-172S on a solo cross country down to Tucson, AZ a year or so ago. The Tucson tower controller set me up to land on 11R, and told me "caution wake turbulence, Pilatus on approach for the parallel." The jackass lied though, ended up being a couple of AZ Air Nat'l guard F-16's, they buzzed past me, a couple hundred feet off my left wing. Immediately threw me into close to a 50 degree bank and spooked the crap outta me with their roaring engines, but I was still pretty stoked to have seen them that close and in the air.

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Here are some pictures I took last summer during an airshow in Hechtel, Belgium.

 

DC3 Dakota 1, DC3 Dakota 2

This particular airframe has quite a history. It was used during WW2 in operation Market-Garden dropping paratroopers in 1944, as a cargo lifter during the Berlin Blockade in 1949 and finally as passenger liner for both Lufthansa and KLM. Because of that last, it has been painted in Lufthansa markings on one side and KLM on the other, when it was restored.

 

B 25 Mitchell 1, B 25 Mitchell 2 from Dutch Memorial Flight.

 

Czech Air Force JAS 39 Gripen

 

Huey and Sea King An Austrian Bundesheer Agusta Bell 212 Twin Huey sitting side by side with a Belgian Air Force Westland Mk51 Sea King search and rescue helicopter.

 

Belgian F-16 in your face! :D

 

Intercept 1, Intercept 2, Intercept 3 The cherry on top of the cake. After ferrying 120 terminally-ill children to the show, this brand-new Boeing 737-800 (delivered only 8 weeks before) participated in a mock-up airial interception together with 4 BAF F-16's. They made 3 passes, in the first the "actual" intercept with one F-16 next to the 737 and one 2 km behind in firing position, while another pair flies top cover. The second had the 737 with its gear down, signaling compliance to follow (pics 1&2) and the last was a flypast with all participants of the intercept (pic 3).

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Well I live near Madison Wisconsin, which supports F-16's. I see, or rather hear them overhead now and again. Their afterburners roar louder than a commercial airliner, so I know when they are passing overhead.

 

I've seen a variety of others as well: A-10's, F-15's, blackhawks, AH-1's, among others.

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