Air Force’s stealth fighters making final flights
The world’s first attack aircraft to employ stealth technology is slipping quietly into history.
The inky black, angular, radar-evading F-117, which spent 27 years in the Air Force arsenal secretly patrolling hostile skies from Serbia to Iraq, will be put in mothballs next month in Nevada.
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The last F-117s scheduled to fly will leave Holloman on April 21, stop in Palmdale, California, for another retirement ceremony, then arrive on April 22 at their final destination: Tonopah Test Range Airfield in Nevada, where the jet made its first flight in 1981.
This is sad — between this and the F-14, all the planes that were cool and cutting-edge when I was a kid are now leaving.
Oh well, the older I get, the more things there are behind me!
Wow – had it been that long?
It seems like the F117 was in service when George Bush protected Texas from the Viet Cong hiding in Oklahoma.
They’ve been around for 27 years? Wow!
I guess that’s why they were called Stealth planes.
Good job!
Think about how long the F16 has been around. Cripes, NATO’s been buying them over 25 years. But, pilots love ’em.
My best bud in military history and strategy discussions has done a couple tours over Afghanistan in one – and loves the critter.
and you will know they are gone because they won’t show-up on radar and……
just waiting to be sold to a hostile country by a republican operative like oliver north to generate cash for some illegal operation
but hey, we’ll get another republican convict on the air waves!
#1 The B-52 is still around just as the A10 Warthog much to the chagrin of the Military Industrial Complex…. Flying the Ferraris are neat, but in a time of war the military, not just ours, has discovered they get more bang for the buck in the solid workhorses.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is the longest time the US had such big technology gap against the rest of the world. 30 years and still no European or Russian stealth aircraft, and no special detection method to detect it, either. Amazing, really.
I still miss the seeing F101 and U2 and all the hours I spent in my C119 and C47 up country.
Would love to get a ride in its replacement.
http://www.kbvp.com/extreme-videos/f-22-raptor
Stealth Technology developed by the Nazis in WWII – used carbon loaded rubber on their subs and had prototype aricraft made of plywood with the same stuff on it to evade radar – The US just perfected it and made lots more !!! Just like missiles – we “rescued” Von Braun from the Russkies so he could “Aim at the Stars” !!!
LINK:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4443934.stm
New planes are pricey:
http://tinyurl.com/3935gj
I had no idea it had been around so long.
I thought the F-117 started flying in 1977. And, how do you know the F-22 or F-35 is it’s replacement…hehehe
#16 – The F-22 is the replacement, not the JSF. As far as how I know. That doesn’t matter… hehehe
Rodrigo said
Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is the longest time the US had such big technology gap against the rest of the world.
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You’re wrong. Numerous countries employ stealth technology…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealth_aircraft
And I guess that you missed the story about the Chinese submarine that sneaked up on the USS Kitty Hawk, undetected…
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/002969.html
BTW, I don’t really think that the US stealth aircraft are as effective as the US government would have you believe. There are numerous accounts of the Russian being able to easily track them. I think that it’s mostly propaganda and myth. I know that the F117s tend to fly low and at night for most of their missions. This is why farmers with SAMs can shoot them down. Anyway, any aircraft would be stealth under such usage.
# 18 JPV “You’re wrong. Numerous countries employ stealth technology…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stealth_aircraft”
Umm, hate to burst your bubble but no other country has operational stealth aircraft. If you read the article it will probably say as much.
When it comes down to it all the stealth in the world ain’t going save us cause they’ll be pissing poison in our food and water watching us all die a slow death then the USA will look like one large Jim Jones Town
#20 I thought our water was already poisoned…
#18 JPV –
I was aboard the Kitty Hawk when we collided with the Russian submarine.
It had nothing to do with stealth. Many people believe that ships at sea are 100% on alert at all times, but that is not true. The Kitty Hawk was transitioning (just moving along) at the time from one planned exercise to another, without a full compliment of picket ships. The Carrier itself has no sonar, depending on the picket ships instead. We were at the lowest level of alert possible.
If we had been at a higher level of alert, considering submarines a threat, then it would have been detected far and away, and actively tracked. But we weren’t even concerned about submarines at the time. I can’t say for sure, but I think that we didn’t even have our own subs with us… normally there are two attack submarines attached to a carrier battle group specifically there for anti-submarine purposes.
The Hawk was going in a straight line, at night. The sub crossed our bow at shallow depth, and it got massively slammed. We ended up with one of the prop blades embedded in our hull. It felt to us like crossing railroad tracks in a car… we think that the sub actually rolled over under the ship. Only one sailor on the Hawk actually saw it surface behind us (the stern watch), breaching on it’s side and fading into the darkness. We launched several helos and offered aid, but it was refused.
But the point is that we weren’t looking for subs at the time.
Incidentally, in a totally unrelated incident, years later the nuclear reactor on the same sub blew up while being serviced at it’s dock. There is a semi-circle of highly radioactive land several miles in radius around the remains of that sub.
27 years? Cripes…time flies
#24, Especially when you can’t see it.
Stealth doesn’t mean invisible so much as low observable. A Stealth aircraft such as the F117 can be detected by radar but it can get really close before being detected. Combine this with good intel as to radar positions and careful flight planning of routes through radar defenses and a F117 is like a ghost.
My understanding of the F117 downed by the Serbs was that they had not been careful in route selection and were surprised by a repositioned mobile radar/sam battery.
My own opinion is that the F-22 is not a replacement for the F117. The Raptor is the ultimate airsuperiority fighter. It’s job is to secure the airspace above a battlefield and deny it to the enemy. The Raptor is not designed or equiped for taking out high value ground targets.
I would be really surprised if there was not a specifically designed replacement for the F117. Posibly even unmanned. The value of the capability pioneered by the F117 is too high to be without.
By the way Grog, I think before long we will learn there are plenty of Democrats who can also be described as convicts.
The F117 not being a Mach 1+ aircraft (because of its design) can’t outrun or out-maneuver other supersonic aircraft or missiles that might chase it. It’s mainly a recon plane, that got drummed into bomber service. But since cheaper unmanned drones can do what the F117 does, and not risk a pilot’s life. This plane usefulness was swiftly made obsolete. The same way spy satellites made the SR71 planes obsolete. Hopefully someday, war will be made obsolete.