Or....thats what they tell.... beacause they allways tell the truth about secret poroyects..... they can find a UFO..... Or a dinosour fart..... they will never tell the truth.....
If Russia has taught us anything, you can never have too many old Cold War Era weapon systems... just in case everything goes to shit and it's all you have left.
@@nosajimiki5885not wrong, at all. I mean I wouldnt be surprised if the US has a boat load of Pattons (M48s) and 113s lying around in a boneyard somewhere with the cannons in pieces for quick repair and deployment in case of an invasion.
@@PSC4.1Pattons are long gone, but the US does actually have a stockpile of M113s that have been slowly dwindling due to donations to Ukraine but are far from being depleted hell, there’s still Sabres in the USAF inventory!
I saw one as I was passing Camp Shelby in Hattisburg. One was flying low over hwy 49 because it was landing at the army base. It was cool realizing it was right overhead.
I saw one when I was in elementary school at an airshow sitting on the tarmac. I didn't know the B2 and F117 were different planes so the main thing I thought was it was much tinier than I imagines. It wasn't until I saw Independence Day that I realized they were different planes.
I spent 9 years working in the F-117 program with the 4450th TFG in both the A-7 section at Nellis AFB. and the F-117 section at Area10. It was a great assignment. Our swing shift avionics super was a next door neighbor to Bob Lazar. He would tell us all this stuff that Lazar was telling him over beers. I know for a fact that Bob Lazar knew the security at area 10, and there is an S-4. We had 2 F-117's and usually an A-7 or two at area 10. We had a pair of A-7's that requested a formation flyby at Nellis AFB at night. When the A-7's completed their flyby the tower gave them a rash of $h!t saying that they were terrible, and that they were the worst they had ever seen. What they didn't know was that there was an F-117 in between them. There were a lot of videos showing the pilots putting a 2,000 lb. bomb in a 55 gallon drum, from 35,000 ft. You never knew what you would see at area 10 when you stepped outside for a smoke. You might see a Mig-23 fly by. or a cruise missile. I once got to witness a B-52 practice a low level nuke drop. There was always something interesting going on there.
You still haven't given us the spoiler.. so have you or have you not seen a ufo flyby where you worked at Area 10? or at least seen a super advanced aircraft flyby that can be labeled as an out of this world tech or next to Bob Lazar's diagrams? Seems like chinese drones are just becoming more and more advanced and picking out all the adv tanks, ships, personnel around the world.
@@PrayerWarriorPh I never saw anything I couldn't identify. I can say, that we do have technology far advanced to what is common knowledge. Aliens, does not mean from some far off planet. It's more like a different dimension. Terrible things happened to get the technology offered.
The only reason the one got shot down is because they flew the same route over and over and got too predictable. Allowing the air defense operator to position and get a lucky shot.
And only by an experienced air defender who violated the standing order to energize their radar no more than twice before packing up and moving locations to minimize the risk of HARMs headed their way.
Air defense also got clever and decided to experiment with different radar bands until they found one that worked. They also set up a decoy target so they could be certain of approach for the very brief time needed to use the targeting radar.
I loved my time with the 117! So happy to see them still flying. Makes me feel not as old. 37 TFW rocked! We really did “own the night”! It had to had the F designation. Because at the same time we were developing and funding a B-2. No way would we be able to fund two bombers. Even though their missions were completely different! Also standing alone it wasn’t completely stealth. Several things had to be retracted and removed to aid in its low RCS!
You sound like you worked on them. That being so, this thing looks like it had a wicked jet exhaust blast. I've stood behind Navy bombers & fighters & at idle, they weren't too bad. But with the size of the openings on the F-117, how was it ?
@@billotto602 wasnt bad at all. Most of the thrust exhaust was directed upwards by the duckbill type exhaust which kept heat signatures down. It had material similar to the space shuttle tiles that was meant for cooling. You used to walk under them to check certain gauges etc on EOR ( End of Runway) checks.
Very nice overview of the F-117 but I was disappointed that you didn't mention its capability to deploy a team of special ops troops onto a 747 while in flight.
I keep hearing "Good evening Lasers & GBUs, this is your Captain speaking..." with the short-sleeved aviator in the PC sim @4:37. "Please settle in and enjoy the flight, where we'll be flying over Baghdad and for those of you seated on the left side of the aircraft can see 'shock & awe'...."
I sold "Jet engine Repair tool sets" for GE Aircraft. Engines. (Example: the tool set for repair/rebuild a jet engine fuel pump.) These tool sets were sold to the US Airforce and US Navy customers. The Tool sets were sold with one part number and price for each set. Sometime later the customers decided they needed a part number for each item in the tool set. ( to replace a missing tool ) GE was not asked to do the recatalog . Air Force or Navy Catalogers who were not familiar with some of the special tools were not able to price the tools. Soooooo. They took the price of the tool set and divided the price by the number of tools in the set. Each tool in the set had the same price. A 10k hammer makes a lot of sense to me.
Here's a theory: It is still good enough for some missions, and why risk an F-22 or B-2 when you have an available, paid for, platform, one whose loss wouldn't jeopardize any cutting edge tech? Edit: And that's the conclusion the video comes to.
The F22 and F35 rely heavily on radar absorbing paint, the F117 is much less so, it was specifically designed to redirect radar, now if you take modern stealth paint and put it on the F117, you are talking like the RCS of a fucking toothpic.
It is also true that the f117 is arguably less visible than a f22 or f35. It is just old, and and also lacks on board stealth radar. It's only obsolescence is in regards to electronics and on board systems. If they upgraded everything beneath the hood, it is essentially a super cheap f35.
For the missions it's going to fly, it's probably going to be completely unmanned in our lifetime. They'll just come up with drones without a cockpit onboard touchscreens or life support systems.
While most military aircraft these days are not aerodynamically stable and need lots of computer assistance to stay in the air, the F-117 was one that just looking at it you immediately thought: there's no way that thing can fly, right? Such an amazing looking aircraft
Want to know something amusing? I built lots of folded paper airplanes as a kid and once built a very rough mockup of the f117 using a bit of tape and scissors. It actually flew really straight which totally surprised me too.
I flew in real life with an ex F117 Pilot and asked about flying the plane because like you I thought weird looking plane must be weird to fly. He was definitive in his answer - It flys beutifully and easily.
Most modern fighters are unstable on the pitch axis. The F-117 was unstable on three, so they used three fly-by-wire computers from the F-16 (at least as a start). Still, I suspect that the Lockheed team did a better job in specifying the plane's needs to its programmers than Boeing did on the MCAS thing.
Stealth is more than about shape. Stealth is also about electronics, radar, improvements in coatings. And for all we know, the F-117 may have aggressively upgraded electronics, radar, coatings on a level with F-35s, making its true current stealth status unknown, except to those authorized to know.
Agree, with new electronics and a stealth coating it would be just as viable now as it was 40 years ago. The F-117 does have an advantage over the F-35, that it's heat signature is smaller. I think a smaller, easier to maintain and repair aircraft is why we are seeing these return. For special missions i could see it having uses. Also lets not forget that the F-35 can't go super sonic without ruining it's coating. If the F-35 were to replace the Nighthawk in it's role, it would have to be a set number of airframes that could never go super sonic to maintain the stealth coating integrity. Just a theory, but it would make sense. Often weird and usually cost effective solutions are what we see for very specific SF missions.
I don’t see why not the A-10 got a significant electronics upgrade. It communicates directly to F-35s and F-22s and acts as a communications network with the rest of the aircraft
Shape/electronics/coatings etc are a lot of the "stealth" but the pilots/planners need to fully understand how stealth works, its limitations and know the radar systems employed against it. You then plan/fly the aircraft so the radar's weaknesses can be exploited.
@@vicdiaz5180stealth ma’boy what about a aircraft that’s named “warthog” with a giant canon sticking out sounds stealthy to you. A10 is good for uncontested skies
It wasn't the delta wing that dispersed radar energy to the side. The faceted shape does much of that (even the edges of the canopy are "sawtooth" to keep energy bouncing off at odd angles). The plane also has a coating of special material that absorbs radar energy, further minimizing the amount of energy returned to any emitter. A regular off-the-shelf delta wing can have a radar cross section that screams, "HERE I AM SHOOT ME" without these other design features.
I really love your videos and I know your target audience is mainly from the US and that is great! For a European man myself its hard to convert every feet, inch, mile etc. to the metric system (to fully comprehend everyting). It would make it a lot easier to follow if you could mention the metric measurements next to the empirical ones if you could! Love your channel and keep up the good work!
Yeah, I watch a lotta tech and engineering related TH-camrs & this is just kinda standard practice, you just run your usual script but have both on screen.
The fact that some of these older designs won't die fits a broader pattern many militaries fall into. Equipment designed to be disposable or used for a limited number of years gets used far beyond that. Sometimes it's because the thing intended to replace it falls way behind schedule in development or ends up not being better enough to actually buy. In this case a new need is articulated and someone thinks the old thing about to be thrown away would suit it, saving a lot of money and time over making another new thing.
Or like posited by the "It's still active" conspiracy, new toys are just too expensive to risk sometimes. Same reason we had mostly SMAW-D & AT-4 on us during the Iraq invasion despite having perfectly capable Javelins as well. The CLU & the rounds are not light by any means nor are they cheap. So we often left them with HQ platoon or weapons squads in support by fire positions. We very rarely actually carried that thing in the rife squad because it was the fancy new toy & we knew damn well a SMAW-D or AT-4 could take out all of Saddam's old Soviet armor.
@@davidvines6498 Some of the funniest pictures from war that I've ever seen was from the Syrian civil war and on the picture was a Syrian insurgent with a legendary weapon... The STG 44... Like how the heck did he get his hands on that?? lol
Its probably still in use because it is still a serviceable aircraft that can be used as a training aircraft and test bed for newer stealth technology while also being used in combat areas where the US wants to intervene without risking newer more valuable aircraft because as you mentioned if lost and unrecoverable it limits the amount of technology lost to near peer militaries. And at the end of the day the newer stealth aircaft face the same issues the F-117 did all those years ago, its hard to mass produce things you want to keep secret, so best to have these F-117s around as they are something that is good enough to at least achieve some task and better than having nothing at all should something bad kick off
@@The88Cheatbecause it's a really expensive aircraft to maintain that doesn't offer anything that the F35 can't do just as well or a B2 can do way better.
According to a colleague at work who was an F-117 pilot (and knows the guy who got shot down IIRC), the one that got shot down was because of complacency of the chief mission planner who was forcing the pilots to fly the same routes over and over, in some cases with little support. This allowed an air defense operator to get lucky with that famous shot
There was more to it than that. First there was a spy in Italy that was passing info to the then yugoslavians about the routes they were taking. Secondly at the time of that deployment there was always heavy jamming in place by EA-6 prowlers but on the night of said shoot down said prowlers were grounded. thirdly, when the shoot down happened they got EXTREMELY lucky to have their search radars on at the exact moment said pilot opened his bomb bay to drop his bombs. Yes, and lastly due to poor mission planning not changing their ingress routes all lead up to that event. But that being said I do believe there were double digits of Nighthawks in the air at that time and only the one was unluckily hit by a sam.
@@necronoverlord2306 bullshit. we didn't get extremely lucky, our guys used a HF radar with wavelengths of 10 meters, it illuminated that tincan easily and it got shot down. I dont understand the need to make up crazy stories when in reality it was just a group of guys with a bit of good old fashioned ingenuity.
Not many B2s in service, but my good friend and neighbor is one of the pilots. They do practice runs over our neighborhood sometimes. It's a beautiful plane.
They even tried to say to they downed 21 of them 🤣🤣🤣 including a B-2. Sad little Serbs, still butt hurt years later. Maybe if they could tell planes apart they would avoid shooting down their own migs. They puff their chest until you talk about air to air combat. The crickets get real loud in that moment.
The remaining airframes entered climate-controlled storage at Tonopah, with several being maintained in flyable condition for the Air Force Flight Test Center. I worked with the F-117 at Holloman AFB from 2000-2004, and the little parachute that came out the back cost well over $10,000 buck for just one.
I was at TTR. The fact was when they first went to Holloman they were kept outdoors just under overhead shelters. I will ALWAYS be convinced that it was that caused the catastrophic wing failure at the airshow. At least my ACESII worked!
The F-117 was always my most favorite aircraft growing up. It just looks so damn cool and futuristic and it's invisible (not as cutting edge nowadays of course)??? Til this day I still bust nuts over how sick this thing looks
Did you notice once the widespread use of the aircraft was seen and pictured, that cars began to mimic those lines? Particularly the smaller sports cars had the razor corner edges of the stealth aircraft. Clearly you weren’t the only one who liked the aesthetic nature of the F117. 😊
You should definitely check out the USAF museum if you haven’t already. Being up close and personal with one of these beautiful machines is an experience that can’t be described.
I think the Air Force has always been super secretive about the F117. I did see one once while in tech school in late 92 early 93. My class was on T shift, which meant our normal duty hours were at night. We marched the same route to and from class every night. One night, there it was, in a hanger far away from the road, way in the back. We all could see it though, and knew what it was. Next night, it was gone, never to be seen again.
correct. they were flying missions for a decade before the dod even announced it to the public. just proves that people thinking they know whats currently being tested or flown is way off based and way out of touch. the military has equipment from the future we have no idea about. civilians dont know anything at all regarding classified things. if its on google its obsolete in practice
Funny thing about the 117 it’s actually a bomber and not a fighter, but because of the Genova convention to put a new bomber in we had to take one out but we had a few open fighter slots open so we basically went ok that’s a fighter that only dose bombing missions
I served on the F117, you can't see them and when you hear them they aren't where your ears tell you they are. Breaking the sound barrier would have caused problems with it's coatings. The IR turrets were not in the belly they were up front and can be clearly seen in these videos. The traditional INU was replaced with a more dependable but less precise Ring Laser Gyro more than 20 years ago. Avionics were similar to the F16 in theory but very different from the F16, it was these fundamentals that caused the program to source Avionics personnel from the F16 career field but not APG, E&E and Weapons. Around the 12 minute mark the video is tail 84-0826 from the 415th TFS in the video, when I worked on it the Aircraft was part of the 9th Fighter SQ. The last time I saw it was the 2002-2003 timeframe and I get a little misty thinking about life then and now.
Quick clarification. The delta wing was part of the stealth design but that is not enough to shrink the radar cross-section. The facets all over the air frame are a major factor. Also, it was unstable but had an advanced fly bi wire system to make it easier for pilots to fly.
@@billkilbourne6409Yes, this was to avoid drawing attention to the program. Same reason it got an F designation when it was really should have had a B or A designation.
Fun Fact; The mathematics that made the modeling and simulation of RCS data possible was developed years prior by a Soviet physicist and mathematician named Pyotr Yakovlevich Ufimtsev. His work, largely ignored in Soviet Russia, caught the attention of Denys Overholser, a stealth engineer at Lockheed. So once again the Lockheed Skunkworks gets to pulled one over on the Soviets, just like they did with the SR-71 when they purchased the Titanium used to construct the plane from the Soviets, the worlds largest supplier at the time. Anyone interested in this topic should read "Skunkworks" by Ben Rich, the lead at Skunkworks after Kelly retired.
Ever since I saw one of these as a kid when it was still in service it’s remained my favorite jet and I’m so glad they’re still around. I hope I’ll see another one in person one day.
@@CheekyMenace No the F-117 was a lot of lessons for the USAF The F-117 was designed for maximum stealth so it lacked a lot EW and ECM the F-22 and F-35s has It also highlighted the USAF/USN shortcomings with SEAD Serbian defense survived because the AGM-88 at the time could only home on actively transmitting radar The newer models of the AGM-88 can home even if the target is cold. Additionally it can track moving targets as well target items beside the radar The EA-18G has datalink so it can transmit target info to closer assets. Thanks to better targeting pods technology, those assets can engage targets up close and at long range Both stealth and SEAD has advanced a lot from the F-117s lessons
@@verdebusterAP No what?? You're going into way more than you initially said. You only mentioned stealth. I agreed and said that they learned the limitations of stealth for that aircraft and time anyway, but it wasn't a permanent limitation as they have incorporated what they learned into further advancements of new stealth aircraft.
@@CheekyMenace The B-21 isnt about stealth The B-21 is about functionality B-2 is stealthy but expensive B-1 is fast but drinks fuel B-52 has great versatility but its very old How do you take their best qualities but still make a bomber for modern and future warfare Sure there are some lessons from the F-117s
I remember I was gifted a metal pencil shaprener/ paperweight model of the F-117 in the late 90's as a kid. I had zero idea of what it was, but I just LOVED it. I thought it was SO COOL!
@@yikemoo They sure are. The F117 sits in the hangars with wings removed and periodicaly they pull them out put the wings back on and fly them around. Also the pilots who fly them have currencies they have to fly that you cannot get on maintenance flghts so some have to be good to go and ready to fly at all times. One of the not acknowledge testing the did was in Syria. They wanted to see if Russian fighter jets could see the F117 and fly to intercept. This operational combat testing is important to gain intel on Russian capabilites. Just like all the stuff we are giving to Ukraine it is just operational testing against their tech. Im sure we are getting a ton of captured equipment as part of the deal.
@@JLeYang Yup it is part of all the munitions we sent Ukraine. We get copies of all captured Russian equipment. The biggest steal we received was russias newest electronic warfare truck. It was the size of a semi trailer. It was more than likely flown directly out to area 51 since that is where all the stealth training is done. They have the facilities to completely test its capabilities. Most don't know but it is an Air Force base but all the services do the most classified plane, helo, and EW testing. The helo that crashed in the bin laden raid was stored there.
What I find cool, in the book Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy, he describes this jet in certain detail. Not all correct obviously, as the book was released in 1986. Recommend the read if anyone hasn't yet.
Good book, Tom Clancy was on the cutting edge of that stuff for quite some time. Also there's another one that I haven't read but heard about where he describes an Ageis like system intercepting a ballistic missile heading for the east coast. Pretty cool!
Actually no, the aircraft he described in "Red Storm Rising" was based on a Revell model of the fictional F-19 (a design which remains classified to this day)
Read "Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed" by far the best book on the F117 and its development from people that actually built the plane and not some civilian.
I did read it and don’t really remember his descriptions of how it was used. I thought the stealth aircraft in the book was used more in an air to air roll but not sure. I also remember the use of drones to overwhelm air defenses.
Nice video...I used to work at Tonopah Test Range when the main project was the F-117a/"Black Jet". I was an air traffic controller, working in the control tower at the time. Thanks for giving me a great reminder of the good old days.
Fun fact: the theory behind low-radar profiles was originally published by a Soviet scientist in 1962. (Specifically how radar signature was more a function of geometry and not size, and how to calculate that signature exactly.) The USSR at the time was not interested in developing stealth aircraft as the concept did not fit into their philosophy or doctrine. They were interested in bigger and faster aircraft with more powerful radars. They did not see any useful military application and so allowed the paper to be published in the west. Lockheed engineers eventually made full use of this theory in the 70's, resulting in the stealth fighter.
The most impressive thing about the B-2 project IMO, is the insane leap in stealth technology they made. The F-117 looks like it was developed in the 70's, while the B-2 still looks like it could have been developed today, and the maiden flight of the B-2 was only 8 years after the F-117's maiden flight. Both of them had ofc been under development for many years before that, but still.... Northrop must have been stealing tech from the future when designing the B-2. Just saying.
Read a book on this exact thing. Northrop used a more holistic approach with the design of the B-2, where, I kid you not, the Radar engineers ate, slept, and breathed the equations for RCS, they were able to design by steps (i.e. design, build, test, wash, rinse, repeat) with smooth curves instead of relying purely on a computer model that could only do flat surfaces as Lockheed did with the F-117. Both programs were so secretive, that it was a case of parallel development.
@@Eihort Absolutely nuts. It's a technological and engineering marvel, to say the least. I'd definitely place it alongside things like the Saturn 5 rocket, the SR-71 Blackbird, and the International Space Station.
Not to divulge anything too deep, but it uses a LOT of the same parts and avionics systems from the F16. It was later integrated with the maintenance lines and even more of those same parts. Its more stealth from some angles than others when it comes to detection. Needs a lot of intel of where radar sites are in advance to fully interdict under stealth. The most expensive parts in the past, when it was "retired" was the coatings and storage. There has been lots of advances to bring that tech price down now, glad to hear they can bring it back.
@@chrissmith7669 hell yeah. The solutions already existed for every issue they ran into. It's closer to a highly specialized F-16 than anything else. Part of the pipeline for becoming a maintainer (mechanic) on 117s internal systems was first going to the F-16 school, then going to a second school to just learn the differences. The outside parts was compartmentalized entirely separately.
@@jawndoekck no we need to stop locking in on democrats and republicans in office. Bipartisan system is still a single party state. Less Democrats though is ok short term
I was present at the airshow at Martin State Airport in Baltimore when the wings fell off at F 117! That was surreal, thank God the pilot was able to eject and landed in the backyard of this family who were having a cookout
Like Habitual Line Crosser said. "Detecting is not that same as targeting". I wonder how many switchblades missiles could fit in a Nighthawk bomb bays? Also air to air missiles?
Like Cappy said, the F-117 lacks its own radar. Some air-to-air missiles have their own radar, but the pilot wouldn’t be able to really tell the missile which target, to well target. There might be ways of getting something to work, but likely not without compromising the F-117d stealth capabilities, and also the question of “why?” when you have platforms like F-22 and F-35.
I can’t imagine a scenario where a F117 would be used with the switchblade. A stealth drone would be a better launch vehicle. That’s why we have stealth drones after all.
@@cruisinguy6024 What if the target area has been saturated with signals that deny any gps or control signals to a drone. As far as we know no drone have been sent on a mission completely controlled by A.I.
@@billykorando which would be more economical? The same way the A-10 was given modification so can the F-117. Make it a A-117. Give a data link and a wing man drone. Also what is the most missiles a Predator drone can carry? F-117 are in the inventory now. Why not modify and use them?
@@billykorando Price. The F-117 is cheaper to deploy than the F-35 and F-22 both who fulfill fighter roles, and far more expensive. The F-117 is a dedicated attacker in a fighter frame. Its the scalpel to the F-35 knife and the F-22 Hammer.
I remember in 9th grade school stopped and they played live footage of the gulf war and showed the f-117....it was almost like seeing a ufo...still love that plane almost as much I love the sr71
The F-117 may be obsolete in terms of stealth technology, but is it easier to defeat than, say, that enormous F-15 Strike Eagle? Than a Super-Hornet? Both of which are current front line attack jets, and neither having any appreciable stealth capability. Than a B-52? My guess is that they're still more than capable of performing any number of missions for the USAF.
As the F-35 comes online the tactical stealth strike role can be handled by it, it doesn't require nearly the same level of upkeep that the F-117 needed to maintain the stealth coating. With the added benefit of the more advanced systems that allow the pilot to detect and deal with pop up SAM threats (like the one that took out Vega 31). And there are more F-35As delivered to the USAF than total F-117s built.
Yes but unless you spend a ton on newer more durable stealth coatings it’s a mute point, the f117 needs super specific and expensive logistical support to be mission capable far beyond even a b2
The F117 Nighthawk has been my all-time favorite airplane from a strictly aesthetic point of view from the moment I first saw one in a picture as a young boy in the early 90’s.
Regards R-2508 complex: I regularly hike and camp in the upper Kern. One of my favorite spots is a granite dome near the Needles, which gives me a great view of the approach to it, overlooking a valley. It's a veritable airshow some weekdays. Mostly F-18s from Lemoore and China Lake, but plenty of 16s and 15s, and in June saw a pair of 35s. Not seen a 117, but might have heard them as there is a surprising amount of activity at night in that corridor.
I still remember the desert storm. It was impressive. This lady was the very first airplane I heard Radar Cross Section. The original thesis was written by , ironically , a Russian mathematician.
That is just a myth. the Russian Mathematician did something that was only tangentially related to stealth technology, it had nothing to do with the 117 or any other stealth aircraft's development.
@@Evirthewarriorit wasn’t tangentially related - it was how electromagnetic waves bounce off of a surface. It is literally the underpinning of the concept that you can defeat radar with geometry. The guys at skunkworks directly cited his work if I remember correctly. He didn’t build anything or develop technology. He worked out the theory.
@@Evirthewarriorand why do you seem pissed off by the mere suggestion that a Russian person did something great? Just because the country has been run by complete shitbags for over a century does not mean all Russians are shit bags. And I’ve got plenty of reason to not be a fan of Russians- my family is Polish, Ukrainian, and Hungarian. Unfortunately, most of my family that stayed behind in Europe didn’t make it through the middle decades of the 20th century for obvious reasons.
@@just9911 That seems pretty tangential to the development. Having nothing to do with the development and only contributing a part of the massive whole that is stealth technology. The way most people tell the myth it is like saying Ernest Rutherford built the first atomic bomb.
When I was a kid I loved this plane I thought it looked so cool I still like how it looks actually. There's a AFB in my city, I remember seeing them fly around pretty often.
Man when I was a kid, this was the COOLEST jet ever. I had a bunch of hot wheels versions, posters all kinds of stuff haha. It was just so futuristic to me (I had no idea it was more than a decade old lol). I never really knew when it was made or utilized, but I do remember as a kid it defintiely was just so different from other jets, I couldn’t imagine how it wasn’t somehow sent back in time 😂
💡 the 'F' in F-117 {Wobblin’ Goblin} was to attract pilots, the none scared type😮 The plane was, as you said, never a fighter... More a bomber. A very stealthy bomber. 👍🏼
My brother was in the Air Force and was assigned to the F-117 unit in 1983. They were based at Tonopah Nevada. He was an enlisted logistics specialist. he would remain with the unit for seven years. After the program was publicly revealed they moved to Holloman AFB in New Mexico. After retirement the F-117s moved back to Tonopah for storage.
Next to the SR-71 the F117 is my favorite plane of all time. I had the pleasure of manning a AN/SPS-40g radar in the middle of the Bering Sea and watched something VERY quickly traveling from West to East covering the distance my radar covered in no time. Think that was the coolest thing I ever witnessed in CiC. Scariest thing to experience in CiC is middle of the night on mid-watch and you're pinged.. It's very loud. Is it ours is it Russias? As one of the watch standers goes over to the sonar and tries to remember the 30 minutes of training we got on it.. Man I miss being at sea.
My understanding is that although low frequency radar can detect stealth aircraft the fact that they are low frequency equalts to a largely diminished precision required to guide anti aircraft missiles to their target. So yes while it (a well as 5th gen) stealth aircraft are detectable with LF and VLF radar that's not the same as saying they're at risk of being targeted.
@@deanwilliams433 you miss the point. The F-117, F-22, and F-35 are designed to not be visible to high frequency radars that fit into missiles and fighter jets. They have never been stealthy to low frequency radars which require very large antenna. Thus a ground based radar with a large antenna can say that a stealth aircraft is in an area and provide an approximate location and vector. Anti-aircraft missile radars cannot lock onto these aircraft because their small size restricts them to high frequency radars which cannot detect these aircraft untill they are exceedingly close, which means that radar guided missiles never get fired as they never get a missile lock at normal engagement distances. The F-117 was immune to infrared (IR) sensor missiles in its day even for missiles fired from behind a F-117 (and all but the latest generation of todays IR missiles). The F-22 and F-35 can easily be seen and targeted by almost all IR missiles of the last 60 years that are fired from behind these aircraft as their jet engine exhaust is not shielded and cooled.
@@deanwilliams433 But the laws of physics apply to all radars. Look up the diffraction limit; basically even with a 100% perfect antenna you will face a physical limit to your resolution that scales with the wavelength- bigger waves have less resolution.
@@deanwilliams433 I'm not an expert on this area, but here's the basics. Because light (and radio) is a wave, it has weird wavey behaviour when you look at the fine detail. One of the knock-on effects of this is that your best possible resolution (in terms of being able to distinguish two objects next to each other) is related to the wavelength of the light (in our case, the radio waves sent by the radar) and the size of the 'lens' being used to collect the reflection from the target (in our case, the 'lens' is actually the radar dish). The function is Theta = 1.22*(Lambda/D) for a circular dish, where Theta is the angular resolution in radians (objects with less angle between them from the radar's perspective will blur together), Lambda is the wavelength, and D is the diameter of the dish. So for a example: Let's say we have a radar with 10m wavelength (for detecting stealth jets) and a circular dish with a diameter of 20m. Theta will equal 0.61 radians, which equals 34.95 degrees. You can also translate that to a separation distance at a given range: At a range of 50 km, the radar will not be able to distinguish objects less than 30km apart from each other. That's obviously nowhere near good enough to guide a missile, we need to be able to distinguish the missile from the target at least until the target is within the lethal radius of the warhead. We can improve the situation by using a larger dish, a smaller wavelength or a bigger warhead. Unfortunately our 20m diameter dish is already rather impractical to be carrying around. We also probably don't want to use a strategic nuke as the warhead of our air defense missile, so the bigger warhead probably isn't an option either. So we decrease the wavelength... but then we can't see stealth jets as easily any more. Quite the dilemma.
@@nerd1000ify You should look at defense in depth and realize that no single radar is used in detection of objects. No aircraft with a vertical tail is undetectable by VHF radar. When all these sensors are connected and thanks to advancements in real time AI data analysis, stealth aircraft are not hard to detect, they are harder to guide a missile to... for now at least
I am very sorry for the miss pronunciation, I don’t claim to be an aviation expert by any means I just think it is really cool. But thank you for educating me it’s always appreciated.
This video and all the information makes me really nostalgic about playing Command and Conquer: Generals where I could build the Nighthawks as units that would shake the ground with their bombs and destroy infantry and vehicles with ease.
@@jasonpeacock9735 I heard that we hired translators to work with Crayola (color commentary) and DC comics (original author) to get the manuals into Marine Speak from the current Candy A** Speak...
I can see the Marines being interested in something like the A-10...lots of firepower, good for CAS, durable to the point that almost anything shy of a direct hit to the fuselage won't take it down quickly... But I think the Nighthawk loses on the operational cost vs benefit ratio for USMC operations. I could be wrong...but if the Marines are headed into a situation where stealthy first-strike capabilities are needed, they're going to be so far from friendly territory that a ground-based attack plane (whose offensive capabilities are limited to two laser-guided bombs each) would require so many logistical hoops to jump through that they'd just have the USAF fly a couple of bombers over the area and hit all the same targets in one pass, as opposed to a few dozen sorties. The Nighthawk really isn't designed for the kinds of conflicts the USMC deploys to.
The USMC got rid of their tanks to buy F35B and F35C aircraft... I think they are far better off without this platform, which requires land bases, than with it.
Nothing makes me more excited than to see old aircraft that should’ve been completely replaced used competitively. The Douglas DC3, Nighthawk, old MIGS, and even this cyberpunk looking birb
The first one I ever saw was is the mid-80s. I was driving at about 125mph on US50 westbound past Fallon Naval Base around 3am when one passed me just as it touched down. It was dark, but clear enough to realize that was a strange plane.
In late 1990, while we were on a company "leisurely jog" around Ft. Eustis on an early Tuesday morning an entire squadron of (8) Nighthawks flew over us on final into Langley AFB. They were incredibly quiet, and of course 30+ years ago, was an awe-inspiring design to see first hand (and of course they were only "rumored" even then)...
The only thing more shrouded in secrecy than a stealth aircraft is their operations. I'm not surprised if we have official channels saying "Oh yeah, we retired that thing" while we most certainly haven't. It's an aircraft designed to operate entirely around deception. Also: when most of the conflicts we've dealt with for a past 20 years have involved old hand-me-down Soviet-era electronics and weapons, of _course_ we're going to keep using a system designed to defeat them.
US fascism mainly bombs third world countries who can't fire back anyway. Meanwhile its more and more certain that the us army is more about a giant money laundring scheme than anything else.
I remember my time in the AF, and seeing these in person was surreal. They had security forces watching over each aircraft, and anyone caught too close to them was warned and could be fired upon. That's how highly confidential these birds were.
I know why the F-117 is back from the dead, it's because Gaijin Entertainment is adding it to War Thunder and the massive popularity it raised convinced the USAF to remove the Nighthawk from retirement for furthermore service! (Please see the irony in this! if this is even ironic idk)
@@greyfish7907 not how stealth works. For the ir: the video doesnt tell you it was invisible, it tells you that IR trackers of the time would have trouble with it. All aspect missiles are much more sensitive, and the f117 does indeed still produce heat, it will be harder to lock, but it wont be invincible, nothing is invincible. For the radar: Put a triangle half in water, and watch as the waves hit it, they won't bounce back towards the source of the waves, but if you move the traingle around, suddenly some start bouncing back. besides, its still pretty stealthy head on even against the most modern radars in WT, if you want to keep it stealthy then you need to fly it as such
A recently discovered principal of stealth is that size does not matter. The Navy discovered this while designing stealth systems for ships. Large objects can be stealthy at lower frequencies🎉🎉🎉
I could possibly see the US Airforce turning its old F-117 Nighthawks into essentially drones. Using them as a distraction for a near peer adversary. Although I could also see them being put into airforce museums.
The F-117 is truly impressive. In 1996 the F-117 docked with a hijacked 747 and completed a mid air transfer of a special forces team on to the 747. Sadly due to severe turbulence during the transfer, the docking tunnel was damaged and Lieutenant Colonel Austin Travis was killed. The rest of the special forces team was successfully able to take back the 747 from the hijacker’s and later perform a successful landing.
The loss of that F117 was mostly due to using the same route area all the time, and radar operators noticed odd reflective radar signatures on each inbound pass. That heightened the tracking ability for shootdown....
The primary reason was chair force arrogance which resulted in the canceling of the ATOs for the EA-6Bs, F-16CJs and F-15Cs that were to escort the F-117s south. LtGen Michael C. Short USAF should have been relieved, demoted and forced to retire over that screwup.
F117 has a hatch on bottom to connect to top opening of passengers airliners. I saw it in a movie, OK? And Steven Seagal has the most powerful martial arts moves.
I mean, it's basically got the guts of an F-16, so replacement parts aren't an issue. If it's used to launch cruise missiles at standoff distances, even Chinese low frequency radar won't see it. If they can replace the expensive first gen coating with something more permanent and less expensive, it's still very viable.
My father took my brother and me to an airshow in Middle River back in the 90's and we saw one of these crash. As everyone was panicking I took advantage of the chaos to jump the line for pilot autographs & free posters 😅
Big thanks to Ridge for gifting me their product and supporting the channel! Here’s the site if you want to check them out! > ridge.com/taskandpurpose
Ill take a pair of pants.
sooooooo fucking kooooooooooool
@@187thRecon2010I’ll see if ridge is down to make a prototype pair
Why doesn’t ridge make a task and purpose version? They have a Chael Sonnen bad guy inc version.
Or....thats what they tell.... beacause they allways tell the truth about secret poroyects..... they can find a UFO..... Or a dinosour fart..... they will never tell the truth.....
An aircraft so stealthy, even its operators don't know if they're still using it or not.
lol good one.
Hell the F-35 is so stealthy that the Marines lost 2 of them.
@@thegreyhound1073 Thats pretty damn good considering the f16 had 17 crashes in a single year back when it was new
@@amazin7006 I really wasn't really joking about them crashing. I meant when they completely lost them. Like they had no idea where they crashed.
Epic comment.
Cappy: "Why is the Air Force deploying a decades old platform to combat in the middle east?"
B-52: *probably bombing someone somewhere right now."
If Russia has taught us anything, you can never have too many old Cold War Era weapon systems... just in case everything goes to shit and it's all you have left.
@@nosajimiki5885not wrong, at all. I mean I wouldnt be surprised if the US has a boat load of Pattons (M48s) and 113s lying around in a boneyard somewhere with the cannons in pieces for quick repair and deployment in case of an invasion.
@@PSC4.1Pattons are long gone, but the US does actually have a stockpile of M113s that have been slowly dwindling due to donations to Ukraine but are far from being depleted
hell, there’s still Sabres in the USAF inventory!
@@nosajimiki5885hence the boneyard these were kept in, and all of those stored and then donated tanks and APCs sent to Ukraine
if the KID finds out he's gonna be pissed.....
Possibly one of the coolest looking planes ever created.
I saw one as I was passing Camp Shelby in Hattisburg. One was flying low over hwy 49 because it was landing at the army base. It was cool realizing it was right overhead.
Especially so from the ground near the nose . It looks like something from Stargate SG-1
@@deonngregory9808 wow that must've been wild to see.
@@mikefallwell1301 oh yeah I never even put those two together, yea I see it. Between the F117/B2/SR71 I think we really nailed it with those designs.
I like how it looks, but also have a lot of favorites I like more. The SR71 Blackbird is my top pick.
I'm 100% willing to believe that the military is using some modified/updated Nighthawks. That jet was my obsession when I was 11.
I saw one when I was in elementary school at an airshow sitting on the tarmac. I didn't know the B2 and F117 were different planes so the main thing I thought was it was much tinier than I imagines. It wasn't until I saw Independence Day that I realized they were different planes.
I spent 9 years working in the F-117 program with the 4450th TFG in both the A-7 section at Nellis AFB. and the F-117 section at Area10. It was a great assignment. Our swing shift avionics super was a next door neighbor to Bob Lazar. He would tell us all this stuff that Lazar was telling him over beers. I know for a fact that Bob Lazar knew the security at area 10, and there is an S-4. We had 2 F-117's and usually an A-7 or two at area 10. We had a pair of A-7's that requested a formation flyby at Nellis AFB at night. When the A-7's completed their flyby the tower gave them a rash of $h!t saying that they were terrible, and that they were the worst they had ever seen. What they didn't know was that there was an F-117 in between them. There were a lot of videos showing the pilots putting a 2,000 lb. bomb in a 55 gallon drum, from 35,000 ft. You never knew what you would see at area 10 when you stepped outside for a smoke. You might see a Mig-23 fly by. or a cruise missile. I once got to witness a B-52 practice a low level nuke drop. There was always something interesting going on there.
You still haven't given us the spoiler.. so have you or have you not seen a ufo flyby where you worked at Area 10? or at least seen a super advanced aircraft flyby that can be labeled as an out of this world tech or next to Bob Lazar's diagrams? Seems like chinese drones are just becoming more and more advanced and picking out all the adv tanks, ships, personnel around the world.
@@PrayerWarriorPh I never saw anything I couldn't identify. I can say, that we do have technology far advanced to what is common knowledge. Aliens, does not mean from some far off planet. It's more like a different dimension. Terrible things happened to get the technology offered.
Do you like tic tacs?
The only reason the one got shot down is because they flew the same route over and over and got too predictable. Allowing the air defense operator to position and get a lucky shot.
And only by an experienced air defender who violated the standing order to energize their radar no more than twice before packing up and moving locations to minimize the risk of HARMs headed their way.
Rookie pilot move
Air defense also got clever and decided to experiment with different radar bands until they found one that worked. They also set up a decoy target so they could be certain of approach for the very brief time needed to use the targeting radar.
@@doujinflip Also, the responsible party was an experienced Russian operator...
I want number of your dealer
I loved my time with the 117! So happy to see them still flying. Makes me feel not as old. 37 TFW rocked! We really did “own the night”! It had to had the F designation. Because at the same time we were developing and funding a B-2. No way would we be able to fund two bombers. Even though their missions were completely different! Also standing alone it wasn’t completely stealth. Several things had to be retracted and removed to aid in its low RCS!
You sound like you worked on them. That being so, this thing looks like it had a wicked jet exhaust blast. I've stood behind Navy bombers & fighters & at idle, they weren't too bad. But with the size of the openings on the F-117, how was it ?
@@billotto602 wasnt bad at all. Most of the thrust exhaust was directed upwards by the duckbill type exhaust which kept heat signatures down. It had material similar to the space shuttle tiles that was meant for cooling. You used to walk under them to check certain gauges etc on EOR ( End of Runway) checks.
@kinch613 very cool. Thank you for adding to the comments.
@@kinch613 I did the midnight flight on the C-5 in 82 😎
@@bear_hunter1334 thats awesome man!
Very nice overview of the F-117 but I was disappointed that you didn't mention its capability to deploy a team of special ops troops onto a 747 while in flight.
Brilliant.
In Hollywood, anything can happen.
It was an Executive Decision to leave that information out.
@@thelandofnod123thank you was tryna remember the movie
@thelandofnod123 This and the OP's comment are absolutely perfect 😂
I keep hearing "Good evening Lasers & GBUs, this is your Captain speaking..." with the short-sleeved aviator in the PC sim @4:37. "Please settle in and enjoy the flight, where we'll be flying over Baghdad and for those of you seated on the left side of the aircraft can see 'shock & awe'...."
Being a contractor working on aircraft a $10k hammer is 100% believable, the cost of some of our tools still astounds me
I sold "Jet engine Repair tool sets" for GE Aircraft. Engines. (Example: the tool set for repair/rebuild a jet engine fuel pump.) These tool sets were sold to the US Airforce and US Navy customers. The Tool sets were sold with one part number and price for each set. Sometime later the customers decided they needed a part number for each item in the tool set. ( to replace a missing tool ) GE was not asked to do the recatalog . Air Force or Navy Catalogers who were not familiar with some of the special tools were not able to price the tools. Soooooo. They took the price of the tool set and divided the price by the number of tools in the set. Each tool in the set had the same price. A 10k hammer makes a lot of sense to me.
Beryllium Copper Tools?
@@58singlemanOr they might have required expensive testing.
Here's a theory: It is still good enough for some missions, and why risk an F-22 or B-2 when you have an available, paid for, platform, one whose loss wouldn't jeopardize any cutting edge tech? Edit: And that's the conclusion the video comes to.
The F22 and F35 rely heavily on radar absorbing paint, the F117 is much less so, it was specifically designed to redirect radar, now if you take modern stealth paint and put it on the F117, you are talking like the RCS of a fucking toothpic.
It is also true that the f117 is arguably less visible than a f22 or f35. It is just old, and and also lacks on board stealth radar. It's only obsolescence is in regards to electronics and on board systems. If they upgraded everything beneath the hood, it is essentially a super cheap f35.
You have the outdated F22 for that
F-117 should be a UCAV
For the missions it's going to fly, it's probably going to be completely unmanned in our lifetime. They'll just come up with drones without a cockpit onboard touchscreens or life support systems.
While most military aircraft these days are not aerodynamically stable and need lots of computer assistance to stay in the air, the F-117 was one that just looking at it you immediately thought: there's no way that thing can fly, right? Such an amazing looking aircraft
Want to know something amusing? I built lots of folded paper airplanes as a kid and once built a very rough mockup of the f117 using a bit of tape and scissors. It actually flew really straight which totally surprised me too.
I flew in real life with an ex F117 Pilot and asked about flying the plane because like you I thought weird looking plane must be weird to fly. He was definitive in his answer - It flys beutifully and easily.
A brick can fly… just put a bigger engine on it!!… the F4 is a prime example lol
@@michaelsherman6492
Phantom: Hot Rock
Most modern fighters are unstable on the pitch axis.
The F-117 was unstable on three, so they used three fly-by-wire computers from the F-16 (at least as a start).
Still, I suspect that the Lockheed team did a better job in specifying the plane's needs to its programmers than Boeing did on the MCAS thing.
Stealth is more than about shape.
Stealth is also about electronics, radar, improvements in coatings.
And for all we know, the F-117 may have aggressively upgraded electronics, radar, coatings on a level with F-35s, making its true current stealth status unknown, except to those authorized to know.
Agree, with new electronics and a stealth coating it would be just as viable now as it was 40 years ago. The F-117 does have an advantage over the F-35, that it's heat signature is smaller. I think a smaller, easier to maintain and repair aircraft is why we are seeing these return. For special missions i could see it having uses. Also lets not forget that the F-35 can't go super sonic without ruining it's coating. If the F-35 were to replace the Nighthawk in it's role, it would have to be a set number of airframes that could never go super sonic to maintain the stealth coating integrity. Just a theory, but it would make sense. Often weird and usually cost effective solutions are what we see for very specific SF missions.
I don’t see why not the A-10 got a significant electronics upgrade. It communicates directly to F-35s and F-22s and acts as a communications network with the rest of the aircraft
Shape/electronics/coatings etc are a lot of the "stealth" but the pilots/planners need to fully understand how stealth works, its limitations and know the radar systems employed against it. You then plan/fly the aircraft so the radar's weaknesses can be exploited.
I thought stealth was about standing perfectly still so nobody can see me... Dammit Drax!
@@vicdiaz5180stealth ma’boy what about a aircraft that’s named “warthog” with a giant canon sticking out sounds stealthy to you. A10 is good for uncontested skies
It wasn't the delta wing that dispersed radar energy to the side. The faceted shape does much of that (even the edges of the canopy are "sawtooth" to keep energy bouncing off at odd angles). The plane also has a coating of special material that absorbs radar energy, further minimizing the amount of energy returned to any emitter. A regular off-the-shelf delta wing can have a radar cross section that screams, "HERE I AM SHOOT ME" without these other design features.
I really love your videos and I know your target audience is mainly from the US and that is great! For a European man myself its hard to convert every feet, inch, mile etc. to the metric system (to fully comprehend everyting). It would make it a lot easier to follow if you could mention the metric measurements next to the empirical ones if you could! Love your channel and keep up the good work!
I’m going to make sure this is I’m going forward !
Yeah, I watch a lotta tech and engineering related TH-camrs & this is just kinda standard practice, you just run your usual script but have both on screen.
Developing countries don't do metrics lol.
The fact that some of these older designs won't die fits a broader pattern many militaries fall into. Equipment designed to be disposable or used for a limited number of years gets used far beyond that. Sometimes it's because the thing intended to replace it falls way behind schedule in development or ends up not being better enough to actually buy. In this case a new need is articulated and someone thinks the old thing about to be thrown away would suit it, saving a lot of money and time over making another new thing.
I think there might still be a Sherman still operating in Africa or South America
Or like posited by the "It's still active" conspiracy, new toys are just too expensive to risk sometimes. Same reason we had mostly SMAW-D & AT-4 on us during the Iraq invasion despite having perfectly capable Javelins as well. The CLU & the rounds are not light by any means nor are they cheap. So we often left them with HQ platoon or weapons squads in support by fire positions. We very rarely actually carried that thing in the rife squad because it was the fancy new toy & we knew damn well a SMAW-D or AT-4 could take out all of Saddam's old Soviet armor.
@@davidvines6498 Some of the funniest pictures from war that I've ever seen was from the Syrian civil war and on the picture was a Syrian insurgent with a legendary weapon... The STG 44... Like how the heck did he get his hands on that?? lol
Its probably still in use because it is still a serviceable aircraft that can be used as a training aircraft and test bed for newer stealth technology while also being used in combat areas where the US wants to intervene without risking newer more valuable aircraft because as you mentioned if lost and unrecoverable it limits the amount of technology lost to near peer militaries.
And at the end of the day the newer stealth aircaft face the same issues the F-117 did all those years ago, its hard to mass produce things you want to keep secret, so best to have these F-117s around as they are something that is good enough to at least achieve some task and better than having nothing at all should something bad kick off
Right? Why dismantle a perfectly good airplane if it still has use?
@@The88Cheatbecause it's a really expensive aircraft to maintain that doesn't offer anything that the F35 can't do just as well or a B2 can do way better.
@@tobiasrietveld3819The F-35 has more tech that could be reverse engineered if shot down and the B-2 is way more expensive
The F117 nighthawk was still flying in September 2021 two nighthawks were part of a exercise in Fresno Ca.
Its also possible whatever part you are making is irrelevant to the integrity of the secret portions of the craft.
According to a colleague at work who was an F-117 pilot (and knows the guy who got shot down IIRC), the one that got shot down was because of complacency of the chief mission planner who was forcing the pilots to fly the same routes over and over, in some cases with little support. This allowed an air defense operator to get lucky with that famous shot
Wasn't that over Iraq back in the 90s?
@@LordDirus007 balkans, not Iraq
There was more to it than that. First there was a spy in Italy that was passing info to the then yugoslavians about the routes they were taking. Secondly at the time of that deployment there was always heavy jamming in place by EA-6 prowlers but on the night of said shoot down said prowlers were grounded. thirdly, when the shoot down happened they got EXTREMELY lucky to have their search radars on at the exact moment said pilot opened his bomb bay to drop his bombs. Yes, and lastly due to poor mission planning not changing their ingress routes all lead up to that event. But that being said I do believe there were double digits of Nighthawks in the air at that time and only the one was unluckily hit by a sam.
There is speculation that they got a radar hit when its bomb bay doors were open.
@@necronoverlord2306 bullshit. we didn't get extremely lucky, our guys used a HF radar with wavelengths of 10 meters, it illuminated that tincan easily and it got shot down. I dont understand the need to make up crazy stories when in reality it was just a group of guys with a bit of good old fashioned ingenuity.
Not many B2s in service, but my good friend and neighbor is one of the pilots. They do practice runs over our neighborhood sometimes. It's a beautiful plane.
Yep with the B-2 you don't need a lot of them.
Waiting for the Serbs "Sorry, we didn't know it was invisible" in 3, 2, 1...
They even tried to say to they downed 21 of them 🤣🤣🤣 including a B-2. Sad little Serbs, still butt hurt years later. Maybe if they could tell planes apart they would avoid shooting down their own migs. They puff their chest until you talk about air to air combat. The crickets get real loud in that moment.
The remaining airframes entered climate-controlled storage at Tonopah, with several being maintained in flyable condition for the Air Force Flight Test Center. I worked with the F-117 at Holloman AFB from 2000-2004, and the little parachute that came out the back cost well over $10,000 buck for just one.
Correct. They still test new equipment in them and are hangared when not in use.
Sounds about right for military spending
Military procurement is the equivalent of telling the cake shop you’re buying it for a wedding…
I was at TTR. The fact was when they first went to Holloman they were kept outdoors just under overhead shelters. I will ALWAYS be convinced that it was that caused the catastrophic wing failure at the airshow. At least my ACESII worked!
@@kinch613 Your ACES II, as in you maintained them or you were sitting in it?
The F-117 was always my most favorite aircraft growing up. It just looks so damn cool and futuristic and it's invisible (not as cutting edge nowadays of course)??? Til this day I still bust nuts over how sick this thing looks
Did you notice once the widespread use of the aircraft was seen and pictured, that cars began to mimic those lines? Particularly the smaller sports cars had the razor corner edges of the stealth aircraft. Clearly you weren’t the only one who liked the aesthetic nature of the F117. 😊
You should definitely check out the USAF museum if you haven’t already. Being up close and personal with one of these beautiful machines is an experience that can’t be described.
According to sandboxx, the F117 is stealthier than J20 and SU57.
You need a girlfriend, dude.
@@Frankie5Angels150 But a girl has curves, not the oblique facets that this man seeks.
I think the Air Force has always been super secretive about the F117. I did see one once while in tech school in late 92 early 93. My class was on T shift, which meant our normal duty hours were at night. We marched the same route to and from class every night. One night, there it was, in a hanger far away from the road, way in the back. We all could see it though, and knew what it was. Next night, it was gone, never to be seen again.
My dad was an F117 crew chief in the early 90’s.
@@notthecracker5816That’s incredible, that must have been an awesome job!
@@notthecracker5816shall we grovel before you? So?
correct. they were flying missions for a decade before the dod even announced it to the public. just proves that people thinking they know whats currently being tested or flown is way off based and way out of touch. the military has equipment from the future we have no idea about. civilians dont know anything at all regarding classified things. if its on google its obsolete in practice
@@skillfulsteak847 Don't be rude. His father served our great country.
Funny thing about the 117 it’s actually a bomber and not a fighter, but because of the Genova convention to put a new bomber in we had to take one out but we had a few open fighter slots open so we basically went ok that’s a fighter that only dose bombing missions
I served on the F117, you can't see them and when you hear them they aren't where your ears tell you they are. Breaking the sound barrier would have caused problems with it's coatings. The IR turrets were not in the belly they were up front and can be clearly seen in these videos. The traditional INU was replaced with a more dependable but less precise Ring Laser Gyro more than 20 years ago. Avionics were similar to the F16 in theory but very different from the F16, it was these fundamentals that caused the program to source Avionics personnel from the F16 career field but not APG, E&E and Weapons. Around the 12 minute mark the video is tail 84-0826 from the 415th TFS in the video, when I worked on it the Aircraft was part of the 9th Fighter SQ. The last time I saw it was the 2002-2003 timeframe and I get a little misty thinking about life then and now.
Quick clarification. The delta wing was part of the stealth design but that is not enough to shrink the radar cross-section. The facets all over the air frame are a major factor. Also, it was unstable but had an advanced fly bi wire system to make it easier for pilots to fly.
F-117 used off the shelf parts where it could. The FBW system was from an F-16
@@billkilbourne6409Yes, this was to avoid drawing attention to the program. Same reason it got an F designation when it was really should have had a B or A designation.
*possible for pilots to fly.
Fun Fact; The mathematics that made the modeling and simulation of RCS data possible was developed years prior by a Soviet physicist and mathematician named Pyotr Yakovlevich Ufimtsev. His work, largely ignored in Soviet Russia, caught the attention of Denys Overholser, a stealth engineer at Lockheed. So once again the Lockheed Skunkworks gets to pulled one over on the Soviets, just like they did with the SR-71 when they purchased the Titanium used to construct the plane from the Soviets, the worlds largest supplier at the time.
Anyone interested in this topic should read "Skunkworks" by Ben Rich, the lead at Skunkworks after Kelly retired.
Not exactly, that scientists work was a derivation and while the U.S. did use some of it they were already developing stealth far before that
"giving new meaning to the term: silent, but deadly"
should've been the slogan for the entire USAF stealth program
Silent? The F-117 was very loud.
Honestly, the plane designs from the 60s 70s and 80s were so so good.
Good one, Chris. Thank you! I especially appreciated "mothball to fireball."
Ever since I saw one of these as a kid when it was still in service it’s remained my favorite jet and I’m so glad they’re still around. I hope I’ll see another one in person one day.
The advantages of avoiding GPS jamming for both navigation and munitions is huge, particularly as countries get better at jamming or spoofing gps
The F-117 proved the concept of stealth can work and also proved the limitations of stealth
The limitations of stealth for that aircraft and time anyway. I'm sure they have learned some new tricks that went into the B-2 and now B-21.
@@CheekyMenace
No the F-117 was a lot of lessons for the USAF
The F-117 was designed for maximum stealth so it lacked a lot EW and ECM the F-22 and F-35s has
It also highlighted the USAF/USN shortcomings with SEAD
Serbian defense survived because the AGM-88 at the time could only home on actively transmitting radar
The newer models of the AGM-88 can home even if the target is cold. Additionally it can track moving targets as well target items beside the radar
The EA-18G has datalink so it can transmit target info to closer assets. Thanks to better targeting pods technology, those assets can engage targets up close and at long range
Both stealth and SEAD has advanced a lot from the F-117s lessons
@@verdebusterAP No what?? You're going into way more than you initially said. You only mentioned stealth. I agreed and said that they learned the limitations of stealth for that aircraft and time anyway, but it wasn't a permanent limitation as they have incorporated what they learned into further advancements of new stealth aircraft.
@@CheekyMenace
The B-21 isnt about stealth
The B-21 is about functionality
B-2 is stealthy but expensive
B-1 is fast but drinks fuel
B-52 has great versatility but its very old
How do you take their best qualities but still make a bomber for modern and future warfare
Sure there are some lessons from the F-117s
I remember I was gifted a metal pencil shaprener/ paperweight model of the F-117 in the late 90's as a kid. I had zero idea of what it was, but I just LOVED it. I thought it was SO COOL!
13:17 It wasnt an actual classified leak. That manual was already available online. Ive had it for quite some time.
I saw one of these flying in Duluth, MN. Around August of this year, I saw them 2 days in a row.
Type 1000 storage is flyable storage. So you have to fly them every once in a while. Also its used for testing in the Air Force.
I've actually always been very curious about what happens in type 1000. Are there really scheduled maintenance flights?
@@yikemoo They sure are. The F117 sits in the hangars with wings removed and periodicaly they pull them out put the wings back on and fly them around. Also the pilots who fly them have currencies they have to fly that you cannot get on maintenance flghts so some have to be good to go and ready to fly at all times. One of the not acknowledge testing the did was in Syria. They wanted to see if Russian fighter jets could see the F117 and fly to intercept. This operational combat testing is important to gain intel on Russian capabilites. Just like all the stuff we are giving to Ukraine it is just operational testing against their tech. Im sure we are getting a ton of captured equipment as part of the deal.
@@jamieaulbach5120 There's a pic floating around social media of a T-80 on a flatbed trailer in Louisiana, iirc, from about a year ago
@yikemoo it was a T90A going to Aberdeen Proving Grounds
@@JLeYang Yup it is part of all the munitions we sent Ukraine. We get copies of all captured Russian equipment. The biggest steal we received was russias newest electronic warfare truck. It was the size of a semi trailer. It was more than likely flown directly out to area 51 since that is where all the stealth training is done. They have the facilities to completely test its capabilities. Most don't know but it is an Air Force base but all the services do the most classified plane, helo, and EW testing. The helo that crashed in the bin laden raid was stored there.
What I find cool, in the book Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy, he describes this jet in certain detail. Not all correct obviously, as the book was released in 1986. Recommend the read if anyone hasn't yet.
Good book, Tom Clancy was on the cutting edge of that stuff for quite some time. Also there's another one that I haven't read but heard about where he describes an Ageis like system intercepting a ballistic missile heading for the east coast. Pretty cool!
Actually no, the aircraft he described in "Red Storm Rising" was based on a Revell model of the fictional F-19 (a design which remains classified to this day)
Read "Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed" by far the best book on the F117 and its development from people that actually built the plane and not some civilian.
I did read it and don’t really remember his descriptions of how it was used. I thought the stealth aircraft in the book was used more in an air to air roll but not sure. I also remember the use of drones to overwhelm air defenses.
Nice video...I used to work at Tonopah Test Range when the main project was the F-117a/"Black Jet". I was an air traffic controller, working in the control tower at the time. Thanks for giving me a great reminder of the good old days.
Fun fact: the theory behind low-radar profiles was originally published by a Soviet scientist in 1962. (Specifically how radar signature was more a function of geometry and not size, and how to calculate that signature exactly.) The USSR at the time was not interested in developing stealth aircraft as the concept did not fit into their philosophy or doctrine. They were interested in bigger and faster aircraft with more powerful radars. They did not see any useful military application and so allowed the paper to be published in the west. Lockheed engineers eventually made full use of this theory in the 70's, resulting in the stealth fighter.
That thing still looks absolutely iconic and looks so unreal if seen from the ground
The most impressive thing about the B-2 project IMO, is the insane leap in stealth technology they made. The F-117 looks like it was developed in the 70's, while the B-2 still looks like it could have been developed today, and the maiden flight of the B-2 was only 8 years after the F-117's maiden flight. Both of them had ofc been under development for many years before that, but still.... Northrop must have been stealing tech from the future when designing the B-2. Just saying.
Read a book on this exact thing. Northrop used a more holistic approach with the design of the B-2, where, I kid you not, the Radar engineers ate, slept, and breathed the equations for RCS, they were able to design by steps (i.e. design, build, test, wash, rinse, repeat) with smooth curves instead of relying purely on a computer model that could only do flat surfaces as Lockheed did with the F-117. Both programs were so secretive, that it was a case of parallel development.
@@Eihort Absolutely nuts. It's a technological and engineering marvel, to say the least. I'd definitely place it alongside things like the Saturn 5 rocket, the SR-71 Blackbird, and the International Space Station.
Still is being developed today, if you look at China.
@@aionarkhe5260 What do you mean?
Just being a smart ass, the stealth bomber they've been showing off in development is a clear ripoff of the B-2.
Not to divulge anything too deep, but it uses a LOT of the same parts and avionics systems from the F16. It was later integrated with the maintenance lines and even more of those same parts. Its more stealth from some angles than others when it comes to detection. Needs a lot of intel of where radar sites are in advance to fully interdict under stealth. The most expensive parts in the past, when it was "retired" was the coatings and storage. There has been lots of advances to bring that tech price down now, glad to hear they can bring it back.
It was a parts bin special other than the stealth bits.
@@chrissmith7669 hell yeah. The solutions already existed for every issue they ran into. It's closer to a highly specialized F-16 than anything else. Part of the pipeline for becoming a maintainer (mechanic) on 117s internal systems was first going to the F-16 school, then going to a second school to just learn the differences. The outside parts was compartmentalized entirely separately.
@danielescobar7618 thanks for info. But opsec my bud...
@@jawndoekck it’s not relevant
@@jawndoekck no we need to stop locking in on democrats and republicans in office. Bipartisan system is still a single party state. Less Democrats though is ok short term
I was present at the airshow at Martin State Airport in Baltimore when the wings fell off at F 117! That was surreal, thank God the pilot was able to eject and landed in the backyard of this family who were having a cookout
Like Habitual Line Crosser said. "Detecting is not that same as targeting". I wonder how many switchblades missiles could fit in a Nighthawk bomb bays? Also air to air missiles?
Like Cappy said, the F-117 lacks its own radar. Some air-to-air missiles have their own radar, but the pilot wouldn’t be able to really tell the missile which target, to well target.
There might be ways of getting something to work, but likely not without compromising the F-117d stealth capabilities, and also the question of “why?” when you have platforms like F-22 and F-35.
I can’t imagine a scenario where a F117 would be used with the switchblade. A stealth drone would be a better launch vehicle. That’s why we have stealth drones after all.
@@cruisinguy6024 What if the target area has been saturated with signals that deny any gps or control signals to a drone. As far as we know no drone have been sent on a mission completely controlled by A.I.
@@billykorando which would be more economical? The same way the A-10 was given modification so can the F-117. Make it a A-117. Give a data link and a wing man drone. Also what is the most missiles a Predator drone can carry? F-117 are in the inventory now. Why not modify and use them?
@@billykorando Price.
The F-117 is cheaper to deploy than the F-35 and F-22 both who fulfill fighter roles, and far more expensive. The F-117 is a dedicated attacker in a fighter frame. Its the scalpel to the F-35 knife and the F-22 Hammer.
I remember in 9th grade school stopped and they played live footage of the gulf war and showed the f-117....it was almost like seeing a ufo...still love that plane almost as much I love the sr71
The F-117 may be obsolete in terms of stealth technology, but is it easier to defeat than, say, that enormous F-15 Strike Eagle? Than a Super-Hornet? Both of which are current front line attack jets, and neither having any appreciable stealth capability. Than a B-52?
My guess is that they're still more than capable of performing any number of missions for the USAF.
As the F-35 comes online the tactical stealth strike role can be handled by it, it doesn't require nearly the same level of upkeep that the F-117 needed to maintain the stealth coating. With the added benefit of the more advanced systems that allow the pilot to detect and deal with pop up SAM threats (like the one that took out Vega 31).
And there are more F-35As delivered to the USAF than total F-117s built.
A squadon of F-15s or F-18s has a smaller radar return than *ONE* BUFF
But B-52s aren't *expected* to go so deep into harm's way anymore
Yes but unless you spend a ton on newer more durable stealth coatings it’s a mute point, the f117 needs super specific and expensive logistical support to be mission capable far beyond even a b2
@@Farweaselyeah it’s just a cruise missile truck, a big badqss cruise missile truck
@@Teampeglegthis also the f35 is stealthier has better datalink systems ew capabilities air to air self defense, more payload etc
The F117 Nighthawk has been my all-time favorite airplane from a strictly aesthetic point of view from the moment I first saw one in a picture as a young boy in the early 90’s.
Regards R-2508 complex: I regularly hike and camp in the upper Kern. One of my favorite spots is a granite dome near the Needles, which gives me a great view of the approach to it, overlooking a valley. It's a veritable airshow some weekdays. Mostly F-18s from Lemoore and China Lake, but plenty of 16s and 15s, and in June saw a pair of 35s. Not seen a 117, but might have heard them as there is a surprising amount of activity at night in that corridor.
I still remember the desert storm. It was impressive. This lady was the very first airplane I heard Radar Cross Section. The original thesis was written by , ironically , a Russian mathematician.
is this a AI-generated comment?
That is just a myth. the Russian Mathematician did something that was only tangentially related to stealth technology, it had nothing to do with the 117 or any other stealth aircraft's development.
@@Evirthewarriorit wasn’t tangentially related - it was how electromagnetic waves bounce off of a surface. It is literally the underpinning of the concept that you can defeat radar with geometry. The guys at skunkworks directly cited his work if I remember correctly.
He didn’t build anything or develop technology. He worked out the theory.
@@Evirthewarriorand why do you seem pissed off by the mere suggestion that a Russian person did something great? Just because the country has been run by complete shitbags for over a century does not mean all Russians are shit bags. And I’ve got plenty of reason to not be a fan of Russians- my family is Polish, Ukrainian, and Hungarian. Unfortunately, most of my family that stayed behind in Europe didn’t make it through the middle decades of the 20th century for obvious reasons.
@@just9911 That seems pretty tangential to the development. Having nothing to do with the development and only contributing a part of the massive whole that is stealth technology.
The way most people tell the myth it is like saying Ernest Rutherford built the first atomic bomb.
"You don't actually think they spend $20,000 on a hammer, $30,000 on a toilet seat, do you?" -Julius Levinson
7:33
Soviet Union: Radar's Clear
F-117 Nighthawk: Hi *Drops payload*
Soviet Union: Welp, I really called Murphy on that one huh?
lol
And in addition to everything you discussed, it JUST LOOKS COOL.
When I was a kid I loved this plane I thought it looked so cool I still like how it looks actually. There's a AFB in my city, I remember seeing them fly around pretty often.
Man when I was a kid, this was the COOLEST jet ever. I had a bunch of hot wheels versions, posters all kinds of stuff haha.
It was just so futuristic to me (I had no idea it was more than a decade old lol). I never really knew when it was made or utilized, but I do remember as a kid it defintiely was just so different from other jets, I couldn’t imagine how it wasn’t somehow sent back in time 😂
As a kid who grew up with all the fancy tech
Its still too futuristic
This channel keeps getting better ❤
💡 the 'F' in F-117 {Wobblin’ Goblin} was to attract pilots, the none scared type😮 The plane was, as you said, never a fighter... More a bomber. A very stealthy bomber. 👍🏼
There were FB-x designated aircraft, so that theory is incomplete.
Treaty workaround
My brother was in the Air Force and was assigned to the F-117 unit in 1983. They were based at Tonopah Nevada. He was an enlisted logistics specialist. he would remain with the unit for seven years. After the program was publicly revealed they moved to Holloman AFB in New Mexico. After retirement the F-117s moved back to Tonopah for storage.
Next to the SR-71 the F117 is my favorite plane of all time. I had the pleasure of manning a AN/SPS-40g radar in the middle of the Bering Sea and watched something VERY quickly traveling from West to East covering the distance my radar covered in no time. Think that was the coolest thing I ever witnessed in CiC. Scariest thing to experience in CiC is middle of the night on mid-watch and you're pinged.. It's very loud. Is it ours is it Russias? As one of the watch standers goes over to the sonar and tries to remember the 30 minutes of training we got on it.. Man I miss being at sea.
For a super high value target they would make the ultimate drone. No point in destroying them with that option can be used at a later date.
My understanding is that although low frequency radar can detect stealth aircraft the fact that they are low frequency equalts to a largely diminished precision required to guide anti aircraft missiles to their target. So yes while it (a well as 5th gen) stealth aircraft are detectable with LF and VLF radar that's not the same as saying they're at risk of being targeted.
Modern radars are far more capable than the 60's tech the Serbs used.
@@deanwilliams433 you miss the point. The F-117, F-22, and F-35 are designed to not be visible to high frequency radars that fit into missiles and fighter jets. They have never been stealthy to low frequency radars which require very large antenna.
Thus a ground based radar with a large antenna can say that a stealth aircraft is in an area and provide an approximate location and vector. Anti-aircraft missile radars cannot lock onto these aircraft because their small size restricts them to high frequency radars which cannot detect these aircraft untill they are exceedingly close, which means that radar guided missiles never get fired as they never get a missile lock at normal engagement distances.
The F-117 was immune to infrared (IR) sensor missiles in its day even for missiles fired from behind a F-117 (and all but the latest generation of todays IR missiles). The F-22 and F-35 can easily be seen and targeted by almost all IR missiles of the last 60 years that are fired from behind these aircraft as their jet engine exhaust is not shielded and cooled.
@@deanwilliams433 But the laws of physics apply to all radars. Look up the diffraction limit; basically even with a 100% perfect antenna you will face a physical limit to your resolution that scales with the wavelength- bigger waves have less resolution.
@@deanwilliams433 I'm not an expert on this area, but here's the basics. Because light (and radio) is a wave, it has weird wavey behaviour when you look at the fine detail. One of the knock-on effects of this is that your best possible resolution (in terms of being able to distinguish two objects next to each other) is related to the wavelength of the light (in our case, the radio waves sent by the radar) and the size of the 'lens' being used to collect the reflection from the target (in our case, the 'lens' is actually the radar dish). The function is Theta = 1.22*(Lambda/D) for a circular dish, where Theta is the angular resolution in radians (objects with less angle between them from the radar's perspective will blur together), Lambda is the wavelength, and D is the diameter of the dish.
So for a example: Let's say we have a radar with 10m wavelength (for detecting stealth jets) and a circular dish with a diameter of 20m. Theta will equal 0.61 radians, which equals 34.95 degrees. You can also translate that to a separation distance at a given range: At a range of 50 km, the radar will not be able to distinguish objects less than 30km apart from each other. That's obviously nowhere near good enough to guide a missile, we need to be able to distinguish the missile from the target at least until the target is within the lethal radius of the warhead. We can improve the situation by using a larger dish, a smaller wavelength or a bigger warhead. Unfortunately our 20m diameter dish is already rather impractical to be carrying around. We also probably don't want to use a strategic nuke as the warhead of our air defense missile, so the bigger warhead probably isn't an option either. So we decrease the wavelength... but then we can't see stealth jets as easily any more. Quite the dilemma.
@@nerd1000ify You should look at defense in depth and realize that no single radar is used in detection of objects. No aircraft with a vertical tail is undetectable by VHF radar. When all these sensors are connected and thanks to advancements in real time AI data analysis, stealth aircraft are not hard to detect, they are harder to guide a missile to... for now at least
In my opinion the F-117 is still incredibly amazing!
F-117
@@thespacemanfilto be fair a lot of ppl generally refer it as the F one seventeen
@@lee.as.in.l.e.e.7394he means the Formula 1, driver #17, duh 🙄
I am very sorry for the miss pronunciation, I don’t claim to be an aviation expert by any means I just think it is really cool. But thank you for educating me it’s always appreciated.
SR-71, B2, and F-117 are the most insane looking and performing aircrafts. Works of art but extreme weapons of war.
This video and all the information makes me really nostalgic about playing Command and Conquer: Generals where I could build the Nighthawks as units that would shake the ground with their bombs and destroy infantry and vehicles with ease.
Ferrari testarossa, Scarface amounts of cocaine and this bad boy are the quintessential 80s items you cant live without
I never understand why the air force retires aircraft when you know the Marines would gladly take them.
They can’t transfer these to the Marine Corp because the maintenance and operation manuals were never made in the form of coloring books
@@jasonpeacock9735 I heard that we hired translators to work with Crayola (color commentary) and DC comics (original author) to get the manuals into Marine Speak from the current Candy A** Speak...
I can see the Marines being interested in something like the A-10...lots of firepower, good for CAS, durable to the point that almost anything shy of a direct hit to the fuselage won't take it down quickly...
But I think the Nighthawk loses on the operational cost vs benefit ratio for USMC operations. I could be wrong...but if the Marines are headed into a situation where stealthy first-strike capabilities are needed, they're going to be so far from friendly territory that a ground-based attack plane (whose offensive capabilities are limited to two laser-guided bombs each) would require so many logistical hoops to jump through that they'd just have the USAF fly a couple of bombers over the area and hit all the same targets in one pass, as opposed to a few dozen sorties.
The Nighthawk really isn't designed for the kinds of conflicts the USMC deploys to.
@@matchesburn The USMC will have to make do with F-35Cs. 😉
The USMC got rid of their tanks to buy F35B and F35C aircraft... I think they are far better off without this platform, which requires land bases, than with it.
Always liked the Nighthawk. Felt like the perfect future plane. Angled, black, sharp, stealthy. Great combo
The first sim game I played in the 90’s was the F-117. It’s a model close to my heart
These aircraft do have great style. They might be a very old design, but they are a timeless classic.
Nothing makes me more excited than to see old aircraft that should’ve been completely replaced used competitively. The Douglas DC3, Nighthawk, old MIGS, and even this cyberpunk looking birb
"Giving new meaning to the term.... Silent but deadly." COME ON DUDE! That one killed me! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
The first one I ever saw was is the mid-80s. I was driving at about 125mph on US50 westbound past Fallon Naval Base around 3am when one passed me just as it touched down. It was dark, but clear enough to realize that was a strange plane.
“Officer, I was just driving that fast as a stealth military aircraft target.” I, myself, had such an experience with A-10s in SC.
"I used to be a badass, now I just have one."
In late 1990, while we were on a company "leisurely jog" around Ft. Eustis on an early Tuesday morning an entire squadron of (8) Nighthawks flew over us on final into Langley AFB. They were incredibly quiet, and of course 30+ years ago, was an awe-inspiring design to see first hand (and of course they were only "rumored" even then)...
Honestly, I liked that you said giving A new meaning to the phrase, silent but deadly!
The only thing more shrouded in secrecy than a stealth aircraft is their operations. I'm not surprised if we have official channels saying "Oh yeah, we retired that thing" while we most certainly haven't. It's an aircraft designed to operate entirely around deception.
Also: when most of the conflicts we've dealt with for a past 20 years have involved old hand-me-down Soviet-era electronics and weapons, of _course_ we're going to keep using a system designed to defeat them.
US fascism mainly bombs third world countries who can't fire back anyway.
Meanwhile its more and more certain that the us army is more about a giant money laundring scheme than anything else.
when I see Cybertruck, it reminds me of Nighthawk
When I see a Cybertruck, I see a child that got a participation award 😆
The difference is that the Cybertruck is slightly bullet proof.
Underrated comment
IS THIS A WARTHUNDER REFERENCE!??!!? 😱
I remember my time in the AF, and seeing these in person was surreal. They had security forces watching over each aircraft, and anyone caught too close to them was warned and could be fired upon. That's how highly confidential these birds were.
The f117 is the most vibey aircraft there is. To this day it still looks crazy as hell.
I know why the F-117 is back from the dead, it's because Gaijin Entertainment is adding it to War Thunder and the massive popularity it raised convinced the USAF to remove the Nighthawk from retirement for furthermore service! (Please see the irony in this! if this is even ironic idk)
@@greyfish7907 not how stealth works.
For the ir:
the video doesnt tell you it was invisible, it tells you that IR trackers of the time would have trouble with it.
All aspect missiles are much more sensitive, and the f117 does indeed still produce heat, it will be harder to lock, but it wont be invincible, nothing is invincible.
For the radar:
Put a triangle half in water, and watch as the waves hit it, they won't bounce back towards the source of the waves, but if you move the traingle around, suddenly some start bouncing back. besides, its still pretty stealthy head on even against the most modern radars in WT, if you want to keep it stealthy then you need to fly it as such
A recently discovered principal of stealth is that size does not matter. The Navy discovered this while designing stealth systems for ships. Large objects can be stealthy at lower frequencies🎉🎉🎉
I could possibly see the US Airforce turning its old F-117 Nighthawks into essentially drones. Using them as a distraction for a near peer adversary. Although I could also see them being put into airforce museums.
Training aircraft for other stealth fighters to fight.
The F-117 is truly impressive. In 1996 the F-117 docked with a hijacked 747 and completed a mid air transfer of a special forces team on to the 747. Sadly due to severe turbulence during the transfer, the docking tunnel was damaged and Lieutenant Colonel Austin Travis was killed. The rest of the special forces team was successfully able to take back the 747 from the hijacker’s and later perform a successful landing.
When you are content to be simply yourself and don't compare or compete, everybody will respect you.
I know the Nighthawk is from 1981, but it still looks scifi to me.
Awesome video! Keep it up!
Thanks !
The loss of that F117 was mostly due to using the same route area all the time, and radar operators noticed odd reflective radar signatures on each inbound pass. That heightened the tracking ability for shootdown....
The primary reason was chair force arrogance which resulted in the canceling of the ATOs for the EA-6Bs, F-16CJs and F-15Cs that were to escort the F-117s south. LtGen Michael C. Short USAF should have been relieved, demoted and forced to retire over that screwup.
1:30 that scene just made the whole video worth it no matter what lol
I want you to know that your shows have EVOLLED wonderfully. GOOID WORK.
my heart skipped a beat when i saw F-117 documents were leaked, thinking "already?" with warthunder releasing the F-117 into the game.
F117 has a hatch on bottom to connect to top opening of passengers airliners. I saw it in a movie, OK? And Steven Seagal has the most powerful martial arts moves.
But did YOU know...passenger jets have a hatch on them to connect them to the F117
So cool that the air force has Chat GPT flying these now on totally unmanned missions.
I mean, it's basically got the guts of an F-16, so replacement parts aren't an issue. If it's used to launch cruise missiles at standoff distances, even Chinese low frequency radar won't see it.
If they can replace the expensive first gen coating with something more permanent and less expensive, it's still very viable.
Okay I don't usually comment on ad reads, but that was one of the better ones I've seen in a while 😂
OMG LOL; that substitute History teacher that pops 'Private Ryan' TOO FUNNY!!! TY!!! All Day!!
Gotta watch it before they ban it!😢
Why would they do that?
This, the B2, the Black Bird and Mr. BRRT BRRT himself the A-10 are my favorite planes.
Thanks!
My father took my brother and me to an airshow in Middle River back in the 90's and we saw one of these crash. As everyone was panicking I took advantage of the chaos to jump the line for pilot autographs & free posters 😅