Street Signs and Bomb Runs
Some of us go down to the Outer Banks (OBX) of North Carolina. I go down to Duck, NC, on a narrow sliver of sand about an hour and a half south of Norfolk. The house where I...
Category: U.S. Air Force
2017 LA County Airshow
One show that definitely stands out each year is the LA County Airshow at Fox Field in Lancaster, California. With such a rich history of aviation testing and pioneers in the Antelope Valley, the setting couldn’t be better. In...
Coalition Integration: Red Flag 17-2
Red Flag is America’s premier training exercise for today’s warfighters. Originally developed to improve our nation’s air to air kill ratio during Vietnam, it has grown into much more than strictly air to air tactics. Red Flag 17-2, which...
Australian International Airshow 2017 – Avalon, Victoria
Avalon 2017 was characterised by the involvement of the Australian Defence Force – led by RAAF – the Royal Australian Air Force. Avalon provides the alternate venue for the ADF’s airshow presence. Air Force’s Plan Jericho, now well established,...
A Grand Phinale at Holloman AFB
QF-4E 74-1638 warming up! Photos by Scott Zeno and Alice Leong The U.S. Air Force retired its final McDonnell Douglas/Boeing QF-4 Phantom IIs on December 21, 2016. The jets were the last of the line… more than four thousand...
The USAF’s 2016 Phinal Phantom II Tour
Photographic coverage by: Joe Kates, Ulrich Seibicke, Scott Jankowski, Mark Hrutkay, Beau Goff, Bob Shane, Alice Leong and Scott Zeno. Story by Ken Kula with Steve Lewis After 53 years of service and having five main versions of the...
RED FLAG 17-1 MEDIA DAY
As I board the bus to head over to the media briefing and interview panel, I can’t help but think about how incredibly fortunate I am to be able to be a part of Red Flag Media Day 17-1....
The Lightning Strikes At Red Flag 17-1
USAF F-35As were the highlight and most interesting participant of the Red Flag 17-1 exercise, which took place from 23 January to 10 February 2017. The F-35As came from the 34th FS of the 388th FW of the Hill Air...
Flying Gas Station of the USAF during Red Flag 13-1 and 13-2 (Blue Forces)
The famous Red Flag exercises includes refueling flights for training and support, usually with the KC-135 Stratotanker. A typical Red Flag mission includes three KC-135 aircraft, although often more aircraft are deployed to have airspares. One tanker is for the Red Forces...
Flying Gas Station of the USAF during Red Flag 12-3 (Red Forces)
Our tanker mission (Callsign “Gulf 17”) included the refuelling of four F-15C/D (Callsigns “Flanker 1 – 4” and six F-16C (Callsigns “Ivan 1 – 4”) of the 65th and 64th AGRS from Nellis AFB, Nevada. The mission was planned...
F-15 Eagles in Europe
The F-15 Eagle, probably the best air superiority fighter ever built, made its first flight in 1972. One thousand eight hundred seventeen Eagles were built for the United States Air Force: F-15A 384 F-15B 61 F-15C 483 F-15D 92 F-15E...
NAS Oceana, VA Air Show 2016
The September 10th and 11th open house recognized the fifteenth anniversary of 9/11 and honored those who lost their lives in the attack on our nation by radical Islamic terrorists. With especially tight security, show-goers were required to pass...
