Hunting for Dinosaurs: Starfighters, Jaguars, Drakens

[Thijs]

Finnish Drakens....great plane. great place

[dinovandoorn]

Some Dino-scans from me

[warthog64]

RAF Mildenhall airshow, may 1990

[tomh]

Long ago, when turbojet dinosaurs ruled the sky, they sometimes came to airshows. They were HUGE, very noisy, and when they were ready to fly, fire burst from their bodies..........



F-102A 55-3436 of the 52 FIW at Suffolk Co. AFB, NY at Bradley Field, CT 4 October 1959
This ADC establishment, comprised of the 2 and 98 FIS, reequipped with F-101B Voodoos, and still later, as a Tactical Fighter Wing, took up residence at Spangdahlem, as many of you are aware.

[eagle]

Le Bourget 1967

[eagle]

Villacoublay 1967

[AK01]

B1 Chaseplanes, not best qality, but nice subject?


Pieter,

[tomh]

F-104G 63-13243 at Griffis AFB, NY., 3 July 1983. I may have posted this aircraft here at Scramble a few years ago, and if so, my apologies. As you may know, we seldom saw these Starfighters in the eastern USA. This one had something to do with filming of the movie "The Right Stuff" I was told. One of my references shows this aircraft as being sold to Taiwan later.

[Iwan Bogels]

Whoopeeee! That howling piece of beauty looks absolutely marvelous. I wish I could have shot it myself. Unfortunately I never got to photograph USAF Starfighters, but I was lucky to get my share of European ones....

More more !
Iwan

[Stefan]

F-104G 63-13243 at Griffis AFB, NY. I may have posted this aircraft here at Scramble a few years ago, and if so, my apologies. As you may know, we seldom saw these Starfighters in the eastern USA. This one had something to do with filming of the movie "The Right Stuff" I was told. One of my references shows this aircraft as being sold to Taiwan later.

Nice one again. This one ended up with the ROCAF as 4368 and crashed 24 March 1990 (w/o 24mar90 weather suddenly went bad, direct landing with TACAN, crashed with 4385 in Hsinchu, Taoyuan (Taiwan) Maj. Li Chung-lian killed)

'Eagle's' SeaVixen and Buccaneer shot is awesome as well...

Regards,
Stefan

[tomh]

"'Eagle's' SeaVixen and Buccaneer shot is awesome as well..." Indeed, I want to bring attention to this shot also, and thank Eagle for sharing. These two are among the many tactical aircraft the American enthusiast like myself was not likely to see. Very interesting designs at that, and a wonderfully historic photo. My guess is that all A-A refueling in the UK involves large tankers, with the "buddy system" (as USN called it) now part of history?

After USAF's ADC Starfighter units inactivated in the early 1960s, few of us east of the Mississippi River ever again had an opportunity to photograph an F-104. The exception to this is Florida, where the Homestead AFB F-104As and F-104A-19s deserve their own chapter in aviation history. But elsewhere in the USA, we were starved for the Starfighter as they entered large-scale service with the NATO countries in the 1960s.

These two poor-quality photos below were a rare exception for me. F-104C 56-0887 from the 479 TFW at George AFB in California made it all the way to the public open house at Bradley Field, CT on 4 October 1964. This was about 6 months before the first deployment of the USAF Starfighters to the Vietnam War.

IIRC, the aircraft was very crowded on the display line, and I waited until it taxied out to participate in a climb demonstration with a T-38 and possibly an F-106. This took place right over the crowd, and the T-38 won easily. Apparently I did not have the camera focused properly, or was too excited to take a proper photo!

[tomh]

Here's a shot of "The Cornfield Bomber", F-106A 58-0787. This aircraft, when operated in 1970 by the 71 FIS at Malmstrom AFB, MT was involved in an incident where the pilot had gottten into a flat spin and ejected. The aircraft recovered and made a soft landing in a cornfield. A local sherrif got in touch with the squadron for advice on how to shut off the engine, as the Delta Dart was slowly being pushed across the snow toward a ditch.

And here is a shot I took of her eleven years later, making another successful landing, this time in the hands of the 49th FIS, a unit that for many years operated a Det at Loring AFB, ME., where I took this picture.

[maurits]

Hi,

A slide-scan update with RAF Jaguars. During an excellent morning visit at Coltishall July 2002 all squadrons were active. An impression of what passed my camera....
XX112/EA 6sq taxies out.

XZ391 in an overall new experimental grey c/s on the main ramp

XZ385/PC from 16sq

Jaguar T4 XX841/PQ

XZ103/FP from 41sq

XX835/FY taxiing back to the ramp

XZ400/GR from 54sq

XX146/GT

XX725 from SAOEU


during TLP some Jags participate in October 2003 here XZ394/GN from 54sq


Regards,

Maurits

[Polecat]

Here's a shot of "The Cornfield Bomber", F-106A 58-0787. This aircraft, when operated in 1970 by the 71 FIS at Malmstrom AFB, MT was involved in an incident where the pilot had gottten into a flat spin and ejected. The aircraft recovered and made a soft landing in a cornfield. A local sherrif got in touch with the squadron for advice on how to shut off the engine, as the Delta Dart was slowly being pushed across the snow toward a ditch.

And here is a shot I took of her eleven years later, making another successful landing, this time in the hands of the 49th FIS, a unit that operated a Det at Loring AFB, ME., where I took this picture, for many years.

great story Tom! Googled it a bit and found http://www.f-106deltadart.com/71fis_Pil ... 580787.htm with some great pics of the incident!!

Please keep posting this heavy-metal!

[maurits]

Some more Dino's, Swedish Viggens. During the Lulea Midsummer open day in 2003 we were guided by a F21 pilot through some F21 hangars, of course the local Skoll Sk37E Viggens could be seen!
Sk.37E 37807/70 from F21 but still in F4 mks

37813/74 in F21 mks

AJSH.37 37922/67

37950/48 in grey colors


Regards,

Maurits