Tag Archives: fighter

Second Weekend Flyover – Super Bugs

The football season includes both college and professional games. I shared some shots of some US Navy F-35Cs that had been in Seattle for a UW football game flyover. They were not alone, though. The Navy also brought some Super Hornets for the Seahawks game on the Sunday. Nancy had come along with me to see the F-35s depart and I was ready to move on, but she enjoyed the departure of the first jets and was happy to wait for the Hornets to go out too.

The nice thing about flyovers is that you know that they will go on time because the game will start to a schedule. They often depart early and fly around locally until the time comes for the flyover. I assume this also builds in some capacity in case they have an issue with one of the jets. We watched them blast out of Boeing Field and then headed on. The return would have been okay, but I wasn’t that bothered, and it was a nice day to be out.

Flare Doors Open on an F-35

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Early in 2024, Mark and I were down in Arizona photographing aviation in all its forms. We did spend a little time in Glendale at Luke AFB and seeing a wide variety of F-35As (if you count variety as meaning very slightly different low visibility markings). One of the jets that came overhead on approach, and it had a pair of open doors on the underside. Initially I thought that this was the Integrated Power Pack outlet but then I saw that was next to the doors. It is actually the flare dispenser and I guess the doors must be stuck open after something from the mission.

Comparison of a Couple of Edits

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Every once in a while, while I am searching for something specific in the Lightroom catalog, I will come across a previous shot that catches my eye for some reason. This might be because it was something interesting, something I had forgotten about or just something that I think might benefit from a re-edit. Sometimes I have changed the way in which I approach edits and in others there is a new tool that has been added which I think will benefit the edit. This image was exactly that. I thought that the masking tools now in Lightroom would make for a more flexible approach to balancing the different parts of the image. I played around with it for a while. Because Lightroom allows you endless virtual copies, you can try something new out without having to lose what was there before. I then created a combination of the two edits to show how differently the same raw file can end up.

The New Jamming Pods Make an Appearance

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When the EA-18G Growler came into service, it made use of the same pods that had been fitted to the EA-6B Prowler. The Navy has had a long running plan to replace the different pod types over time and this is a slow process. The first of the new pods to arrive is the Next Generation Jammer Mid-Band which is built by Raytheon. These have gradually been delivered to fleet squadrons and, while I had seen images of them that local photographers had taken, I hadn’t seen one.

Then, one afternoon, while sitting up at Paine Field, a Growler rolled out after landing and came all the way to the north end of the runway. I had no idea it was coming in and missed the landing completely. It taxied off and I grabbed some shots because it was a color bird. Then I realized it had the new pods fitted. The light was so nice, and I was hoping they would just gas a go but sadly they didn’t and I didn’t get to see them depart. At least I have seen the pods fitted before I left.

Refueling the Hornet

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Two quite different versions of the same thing here. The Comox Air Show this year included demonstrations are aerial refueling with the RCAF Hornet. The first of these was perfectly sensible because it was the Hornet formating on the C-130 Hercules fitted with refueling pods. The Hornet took up station behind the drogue units to demonstrate how refueling would be done.

Later in the show, there was a slightly odder version of things. A USAF KC-135R Stratotanker (which was carrying Kadena tailcodes which might be a first for me) was airborne and the Hornet formated on this too. Some KC-135s do carry hose drogue units on the wings or a drogue adaptor on the end of the boom but this was not one of them. Instead, they simulated the boom refueling. The Hornet can’t refuel from the boom but, since it was just an airshow, I doubt too many people were bothered by this.

If You Have an F-104, Wouldn’t You Mount it on the Wall?

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The California Science Center has featured quite a bit in previous months with the various aircraft and that are preserved outside. There is one I haven’t included previously and that is a Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. This one is a bit more dramatic. It is mounted on a structure attached to the wall of the museum giving it a rather dynamic pose. Seems appropriate given the nature of the Starfighter. It does look like it could do with a repaint, though.

Why Land When a Flyby Would Be Better?

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The view from the tower at Boeing Field is excellent (which makes sense, of course) but, when planes are landing from the south, they will have touched down long before they get close and so are not going to give the best photo opportunities. A small price to pay for having such a good spot to hang out so no complaints from me. However, I was rather pleased with the USAF F-35A demo when it completed its show.

It came in on a curving descent towards the runway but, as it got lower, up came the power and the gear was cleaned up. Keeping it low, the pilot gave us an impressive show as they blasted along the length of Boeing Field’s runway before pulling up aggressively into the downwind. The second time, they did actually land. I would have been fine with a few more of those passes but I guess I shouldn’t be greedy.

Shocking Times with the Blues

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One of the highlights of the Blue Angels’ demonstration is the Sneak Pass. The main formation heads off in one direction and the crowd’s attention follows them. Meanwhile, one of the pair comes running in at high speed and low level from the left catching many people by surprise. Just as this is done, the other of the pair comes at high speed from crowd rear and most people jump again. I am most interested in the first pass because it offers a couple of possibilities. If the atmosphere is humid, you can get some vapor on the jet around the shock waves and expansion fans. If there is a background other than the sky, the other opportunity is to have the refraction from these phenomena distorting whatever is behind.

Seafair does provide a background with Mercer Island providing the backdrop to the pass. The downside is that the display line is a long way out over the lake, so you are stretching the reach of lenses to get a close enough look at the jet. This year I did have the benefit of the long end of the 200-800 so I could get something of the shot I was after. Perhaps not the best of shots but at least there is something of the refraction to see.

First of the Weekend Flyovers – The F-35C

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The Navy brought three F-35Cs to Boeing Field to provide a flyover for one of the UW Huskies’ games. It would have been great to catch them landing but that wasn’t possible, but the game was on a Saturday that I was free, so I headed out to catch them. The conditions were really nice with that sort of fall lighting that can be so welcome. Two jets were going to do the flyover so the spare could wait on the ramp.

They got airborne long in advance of the game itself. Whether this was to allow a little sightseeing or to buy time if there was a need to jump to the spare, I don’t know. I did decide to get some video as they taxied out since it showed off the wings being unfolded. The video is below and is actually a combination of two different departures.

I haven’t seen much of the Charlie models of the F-35 so was happy to have these jets operating locally. The motor in the F-35 is a big one and the take off is not subtle – they do seem to come out of burner pretty early, though. I guess that much power gets you going fast enough pretty quickly. I picked my mid field location for the take offs to get a reasonable angle on the jets as they rotated and climbed out. Then it was time to relocate.

The return of the jets after the flyover had been completed gave the opportunity to get some touchdown shots which I had missed from the day they arrived in Seattle. More good light so all was well. They stayed overnight and then headed back home the following day. A different flyover was happening that day which will be a different post but, in the meantime, there are some bonus shots of the three jets heading back to base.

Growlers Head Home Together

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During Seafair, the USN Growlers from Whidbey Island did a display earlier in the schedule. Once they were done, the jets headed home in midafternoon. They didn’t have a long trip home so getting back to base was probably a simple call. What made it better was that they undertook a section departure and the view from the tower was really cool. The tricky thing about a section departure from a photographic point of view is which plane to track. Which one looks dominant in the shot early on and which is dominant later in the pass? It changes but tracking is harder to switch. Small problem, I know, but a little tricky.