The Italian Air Force recently retired their AMX fleet. I remember seeing early AMX demonstration flights at Farnborough, so this is another one of those moments when you realize you are old enough to have seen the entire life cycle of an aircraft. The “joys” of aging, I guess. Anyway, I figured that, while I hadn’t seen a lot of AMXs over their time, I would reflect the few encounters that I had with them.
I may have worked on the Typhoon/EF2000 in my younger days and have a strong affinity for that plane, but I have always appreciated its competitor from next door, the Dassault Rafale. The Rafale is a very elegant-looking airframe, and it has recently started to sell very well on the export market. One of those customers is India and the Indian Air Force brought some of its jets to Alaska for an exercise. They routed across the US with an overnight stop at McChord AFB (JBLM) before continuing on to Alaska.
I went out with a bunch of friends to see them arrive. They came in two waves and the first arrived in some quite poor conditions. This resulted in them making straight in approaches to the field. This was a bit of grey jets and a grey sky, but it was still worthwhile. There was a fair time between them showing up and the second wave and, by that time, the weather had improved considerably. This allowed them to do a run in and break to landing. Four jets came in but one was clearly offset – presumably getting some shots of the others. They tightened up before the break, though.
The final turns varied in how tight they were but, since the earlier jets had allowed me to get some more standard side-on shots, I decided to get closer to their approach path. I moved in a way for the first jet and then proceeded to sprint closer between each arrival in order to try and vary the angles a bit. If there had been more jets or time, I might have gone for directly on the centerline to get a head on shot but that wasn’t possible. What fun catching something very different to the norm for this area.
When deciding on what garden furniture to have, there are many options. You could have some garden gnomes, maybe a stone lion, all sorts of possibilities. Most of these are because most people don’t have access to a fast jet. If you do, and the California Science Center does, you’d stick a Hornet outside the front door. It was in the shade from the building in the morning I was there, but I thought it provided just the right amount of gravitas.
Arizona is packed with old airframes. You can go to any number of airports and find some old military aircraft stacked up in spare locations. Marana Regional Airport is a great example. Wander along the fence of the airport by the road and you come across a bunch of A-4 Skyhawks and F-8 Crusaders tucked away. The weather is ideal for preserving an airframe and they look like they are in great condition. No idea what state they were in when they arrived and what bits are missing but they do look like they could be so close to being useful even if they are really never going to move again. Oh to see a Crusader or two back in action.
Luke AFB is not just home to a load of USAF F-35s. It is also the training base for many of the export operators. They also allocate some of their jets to the unit, so you do have the opportunity to catch a bunch of jets that are not from the USAF. This includes Italian, Danish, Norwegian and Dutch jets. Aside from the Danish ones that actually have a tiny bit of color in their national markings, all the jets are low viz. At least they are slightly different, even if not very conspicuous.
During the trip with Mark, we made the excursion to El Centro to catch the Harriers. As I wrote in the post about those airframes, I thought it might be the last time I got to photograph Harriers. Turns out, I was a bit premature. With an exercise planned up in Alaska, the Marines were planning on taking ten jets to participate. Their routing staged through Boeing Field. The plan was for two sets of five jets to come across.
The moves were not entirely smooth. Bad weather in our area was not ideal, tanker support was not working to plan and then you get the occasional jet that breaks. However, we did get most of the jets showing up. The first bunch showed up at Boeing Field from the north. They were strung out on the approach but, from certain angles, you could see all of them stretched out over Seattle. One by one they came in and reminded us how loud a Harrier is in STOVL mode.
There was due to be the second wave later in the day, but they ended up showing up on another day. We had departures of the initial jets as well. When they called up for departure, they asked the tower to line up on both runways. This would have put them up at the north and away from where I was. This was a bad development. Fortunately, the tower informed them that they were too heavy for the short runway’s surface rating.
Instead, they lined up on the main runway spread out in a line. They powered up simultaneously and released brakes at the same time. The northern jet had no problem getting airborne in such a short space because of the STOVL capabilities of the Harrier. The jets further back were also airborne quickly and accelerating rapidly while still over the field. They climbed out in a loose line which meant assembling the formation would be a simple process. What a great thing to see one more time. Is that it for me and Harriers????
Every once in a while, the Air Force moves airframes around between units. One may have exhausted the limits on their airframes and they need to be retired or it could just be a balancing exercise to spread the usage types across the larger fleet. The Arizona Air National Guard unit at Tucson has recently received a bunch of different (calling them new would be a stretch) jets that have come from various units around the country. They will be marked up with the AZ tail code in due course but, at the time of my visit, they were still carrying markings from a bunch of other bases. Getting a diverse range of tails before they all became the same was the challenge while there. Here are some of the results.
I have never photographed at Luke AFB before. Mark and I spent a few hours there as part of our trip. The base is home to the F-35A training unit and a variety of foreign F-35A training too. Plenty of USAF F-35s were in the pattern that day. I got loads of shots of the based jets but, with the current style of low observability finishes, the jets did look very alike. Yes, there were crew names and unit badges to be seen but, sadly, one Luke F-35 looks a lot like another Luke F-35.
The designation of the F-16V is one that leaves me a bit confused. There are A model jets that are upgraded to this standard, but I thought some new build jets were also having the designation. Maybe I am mistaken about that. I also see two-seaters upgraded to the standard so an A or a B model can now be a V model? Anyway, enough about that. I got to see some.
Taiwan has been upgrading its fleet of A and B model F-16s to V models. The program is nearly complete from what I have read. They operate a number of the jets from the Guard base in Tucson at the international airport. While Mark and I were there, we got to see a bunch of them launch and recover. This included one with special markings in the fin. The markings are otherwise not too conspicuous but, because they are early model jets, the lack of the bulged fin root with its antenna is the thing that allowed me to identify them. Must be some life left in those airframes despite their age!
Flashback to RIAT and 2019. I was working through the catalog looking for something for another project and came across these shots of Swedish Gripens departing from RAF Fairford after the show had concluded. A section departure is always more interesting than a singleton even if it does give you something to think about when deciding on which plane to focus on. The Gripen is a great looking jet and one that has been pretty successful given that it was built specifically for Swedish needs. Always happy to get to shoot one.
