(Washington D.C.) The ability to fly at Mach 2.5 speeds, maneuver and dogfight with a high 1.24 thrust-to-weight ratio, and perform attack missions with ranges over 1,000 miles are likely reasons why the famous 1980s-era
Air Combat Command's Gen.
May 2, 2005 – 2 F/A-18 Hornets of VMFA-323 are shot down by Iraqi/Al-Qaeda Insurgents over south-central Iraq. Both pilots killed. November 27, 2006- An F-16 Fighting Falcon was shot down by Al-Qaeda/Iraqi insurgents in Fallujah while on a low-altitude ground-strafing run. The pilot, Major Troy Gilbert, was killed.
19/20 January 1991: F-15E-46-MC, 88‑1692, c/n 1101/E076, of the 336th FS, 4th TFW, USAF, was shot down by an Iraqi SA-2E missile during Operation Desert Storm. Both crew members ejected and were POWs.
F-15 Eagle is still one of the most dangerous jets around
The F-15 is a legend. The F-15 Eagle and its variants are some of the most capable jet fighters ever. McDonnell Douglas created and produced it primarily as an air superiority tactical fighter. The Eagle is one of the most successful fighters of the modern era.
The 6 Most Lethal Aircraft in History - Fokker Eindecker, A6M Zero, B-29 Superfortress, AC-130 Spectre, A-10 Thunderbolt, AH-64 Apache.
On 21 January 1991, an F-14B with its pilot, Lieutenant Devon Jones, and Radar Intercept Officer, Lieutenant Lawrence Slade, of VF-103 was shot down by an SA-2 surface-to-air missile while on an escort mission over Al Asad Air Base.
The F-11 Tiger is noted for being the first jet aircraft to shoot itself down. On 21 September 1956, during a test-firing of its 20 mm (0.79 in) cannons, pilot Tom Attridge fired two bursts midway through a shallow dive.
The F-22, the top US air superiority fighter jet, finally has it's first air-to-air kills. In a week, this jet downed a Chinese spy balloon and an unidentified "object" in two separate engagements.
The People's Liberation Army Air Force operates a large and varied fleet of some 4,000 aircraft, of which around 2,566 are combat aircraft (fighter, attack, and bombers). According to FlightGlobal, China has the second-largest active combat aircraft fleet and the third-largest total aircraft fleet in the world.
The only reported F-16 loss was an IDF F-16I that crashed on 19 July when one of its tires burst as it took off for Lebanon from an air base in the Negev. The pilots ejected safely and there were no casualties on the ground.
The A-10 was not built to dogfight
And that's where Fairchild Republic came in with a design for an unusual aircraft that prized resiliency, redundancy, and function over all else. It was nearly as long as it was wide, and the fuselage was little more than a massive 30mm rotary cannon with a cockpit stuck on top.
A wide but underpowered jet with an idiosyncratic tail design, the Cutlass was widely disliked by its operators. A quarter of the Cutlass production order were destroyed in accidents, costing the lives of dozens of pilots and crew.
Smaller UAVs, like the ones shot down by the Israeli F-35s, are more difficult to acquire both visually and with radar and can be just as difficult to secure a lock onto. With its first aerial kills under its belt, the F-35 continues its fight to prove itself on the modern battlefield.
1. Erich “Bubi” Hartmann. Erich Hartmann is the most successful fighter pilot of all times – with 352 kills.
Unsuccessful experimental and prototype fighters assigned numbers in the teen range (13–19) are generally not considered part of the series. Thus it does not include the Northrop YF-17, which later evolved into the F/A-18. The designations F-13 and F-19 were not assigned.
Today in History – September 21, 1956 – Test pilot Tom Attridge shoots himself down in F-11F.
Although the USAF had originally planned to buy a total of 750 ATFs, the program was cut to 187 production aircraft in 2009 due to high costs, a lack of air-to-air missions at the time of production, and the development of the more affordable and versatile F-35. The last F-22 was delivered in 2012.
The US Navy's famed F-14 Tomcat fighter jet first flew on December 21, 1970. When the F-14 was retired in 2006, US officials made the unusual decision to scrap the entire fleet. They didn't want to leave any spare parts for one of the Tomcat's biggest foreign buyers: Iran.
It was the plane featured in the motion picture Top Gun (1986). After 2006 the United States destroyed its mothballed F-14s as part of an effort to keep usable parts from reaching Iran.
The F-14 is much faster and more powerful than the F/A-18, with a top speed of 2.34 Mach, while the Super Hornet reaches Mach 1.8. The F/A-18, however, is more agile than the F-14 as it only needs one pilot instead of two.
China Airlines is generally considered a safe and reputable airline. It is the flag carrier airline of Taiwan and has been operating since 1959. The airline has a good safety record and has implemented various safety measures and protocols to ensure the safety of its passengers and crew.
The failure was the first of its kind for the A380, the world's largest passenger aircraft. At the time of the accident, 39 A380s were operating with five airlines: Qantas, Air France, Emirates, Lufthansa, and Singapore Airlines.
As of December 2021, the global A380 fleet had completed more than 800,000 flights over 7.3 million block hours with no fatalities and no hull losses. As of December 2022, there were 237 aircraft in service with 16 operators worldwide.