Flickertail Deuce

Oh geez, before we get started, I gotta ask... jeet? Don't wantcha'ta miss 'yer supper, so we got'sum hotdish'n tater tots waitin' 'for'ya. Maybe even a Jell-O salad dessert.

Anyhoo, this here's a wonderful pikshur of an F-102A Delta Dagger flown by the 178th Fighter Interceptor Squadron, North Dakota Air National Guard, don'tcha know? Those fellas were known as the Happy Hooligans... oh 'fer cute'... and they flew the 'ole Deuce 'fer just'a few years in the mid-ta-late 1960s. 'Perty neat, huh?

Oh yah, you betcha!

Okey-dokey, you enjoy, now. And remember, it's not the cold, it's the wind, so make-shur ya getcherself a shelterbelt pronto. Well... I s'pose it's about that time... gotta go on out there and cause a ruckus, ya'know. Oh, hey, did I ever tell'ya'bout th'time we went to Minot and...

North Dakota Air National Guard Public Affairs via DVIDS

Well, I better get goin'...

Stacked

 A quickie today... 'tis a fine pre-war snap showing a stepped formation of US Army Air Corps North American BT-9s from Randolph Field, Texas.

Enjoy, and keep your eyes open, mister...

Project 914 Archives (S.Donacik collection)

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Tarbox Tomcats

As the readership may know, your blogmeister has a thing for Cats of the two-tail variety as well as 'purty pikshurs... so today we present a B-U-T-FULL snap of a pair'a Tomcats from VF-33, the Starfighters, near a place called Coffin Island, Puerto Rico back on April 1st, 1990.

VF-33 was at the time embarked aboard USS America (CV-66) as part of Carrier Air Wing One (CVW-1). Over the years, many an enthusiast has mistakenly attributed the callsign 'Tarbox' specifically to VF-33... 'tis not so... VF-33's tactical callsign at that time was 'Starfighter', while 'Tarbox' was the callsign for CVW-1. But an air wing's callsign could be adopted by any squadron of the wing under certain circumstances.  The more you know...

Nomenclature, Baby!

U.S. Navy photo by LCDR K. P. Neubauer

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Вдоводел

Today we bring you a fine photo of a Tupolev Tu-22, known by NATO as the 'Blinder' and by her crews as the 'Widowmaker'... the latter because of the type's propensity for killing said crews. High landing speeds, unreliable engines, and squirrelly handling characteristics all combined for lotsa oopsies. And with the type's downward-firing ejection seats, well... that made low altitude punch-outs somewhat, shall we say... unattractive... so crews usually opted to ride it out during the many takeoff and landing accidents which occurred during the type's service history.

Anyhoo, this particular jet is a Tu-22R recce variant, operated by the 199th Independent Long-Range Reconnaissance Aviation Regiment (say that ten times fast), flying outta Nizhyn Air Base, Ukraine during the 1980s.

Enjoy, but you might wanna consider transferring to fighters...

Vladimir Aleksandrovich Kalinin photo

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Caught Up in a Whirlwind

Today we present a fine photo of the Westland Whirlwind. Introduced in mid‑1940, this twin‑engine fighter packed a punch with its four nose-mounted 20mm Hispanos and was a fine performer at low to medium altitudes. But production was limited to just 114 airframes, largely due to its troublesome Rolls-Royce Peregrine engines. Seeing service with just three RAF squadrons, the type was retired from frontline duty in late 1943, fading into relative obscurity thereafter...

Imperial War Museum

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