The bomber trifecta: The BONE, the Death Dorito, and Grandpa BUFF. 🇺🇸
Seen over the Hudson moments ago, featuring three of America's most iconic strategic bombers.
📹: AccomplishedBrick251
Happy Independence Day! To commemorate the Bicentennial in 1976, an F-4 Phantom II from the VX-4 Evaluators was given a special Star-Spangled Banner and eagle paint scheme.
#IndependenceDay
@Airfix Well, Moffett Field used to have an annual open house and alternate years they hosted the Blue Angels. The show featured a crazy mix of aircraft and was the only time I ever saw an F-104 fly.
Despite its advanced rocket design, the Me 163 required extensive ground support for every flight. It was towed to the runway by a Scheuchschlepper using a tow bar, started with an auxiliary unit, and jettisoned its takeoff dolly shortly after liftoff. After a short powered flight it glided back and landed on a skid. Recovery used a specialized lifting vehicle or inflatable wing cushions to move it quickly to the hangar. Refueling the two hypergolic propellants had to be carried out in separate operations with protective gear and continuous water sprays due to their tendency to ignite explosively on contact.
If
by Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
The Heinkel 100 was (at the time) the world's fastest fighter aircraft. It was rejected in favour of the Messerschmitt Bf109, for reasons still debated by historians today.
Despite the cancellation, several were claimed as 'kills' by Allied pilots, early in World War Two!
Not long after this footage was captured, “Little Audrey,” a P-61A Black Widow of the 425th Night Fighter Squadron, was on a night mission over Gross-Gerau, Germany, on March 24, 1945. The aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft fire, and one of the shells exploded inside, killing the pilot, 1st Lt. Cletus “Tommy” Ormsby. The radar operator survived with serious injuries but was saved by the quick actions of German surgeons. He later reported that they had successfully shot down two Ju 87 Stukas before being hit.🫡