Flying the IAF MiG-23 & MiG-27 Flogger | Sumit Mukerji (Part 1)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 มิ.ย. 2024
- Sumit Mukerji shares what it was like to fly the Indian Air Force MiG-23 and MiG-27 Flogger accompanied by some great stories!
Enjoy
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frankly these Indian air force pilot interviews are some of your best... they are all such cool cucumbers...
Glad you enjoy them mate.
@@Aircrewinterview😊
I grew up in Fiji, at a time when Indians made up 50% of the population. They are mostly very clever, and highly motivated people. Great to hear from one who was a senior fighter pilot!🙏
Great interview...Air Marshal Sumit Mukerji is one of the best Indian Air Force pilots ever and dare I say the best IAF Mig-25 pilot ever.
Cheers!
I think that title can be given to PJ Thakur though, considering he flew successful combat sorties with it in Stinger infested areas. But Sumit is definitely amongst the greatest Mig 25 pilots of not only IAF, but the world
Thank you @Aircrew Interview for releasing part one of this exciting interview! I'm really looking forward to hearing the rest of Mr. Mukerji's facinating story of flight. He is incredibly intelligent, well-spoken, and his story is extremely inspiring! A great role model for young people like me. Greetings from South London, England!
Cheers James.
LMAO at the "four greens". Maybe another type that might have that feature is the SAAB Draken with it's retractable tail bumper wheels.
Fascinating interview. Always enjoy learning about MIGs and the IAF. 🇮🇳
Glad you enjoyed it.
I was hoping to hear more about his Mig-21 time! Great stuff about the Mig-23/27.
i consider the mig 27 , one of the most beautiful aircraft ever
Why? It's an absolute pig of an aircraft
Same here. In the 90's I found F-4 ugly and F-14 even uglier. But ugliest plane I had ever seen was the MiG-23. Until about 2007-10 I started to see MiG-23 in totally new way, it became very beautiful plane. It still has specific angles where it looks horrific. But mostly it is very beautiful. The same is with MiG-27, the nose looks first hand a ugly duckling, but quickly it becomes the most beautiful attack plane. Sexiest plane I know has been last two decades the Su-24. Nothing is better looking. And only the A-6 Intruder gets close from the US side. And lately I have found to be admiring the Su-17 / Su-22, as no matter how I considered it maybe ugliest plane ever flown last 30-40 years, I am totally drawn to it these days.
I am likely so over saturated by the western designs. French designs are exotic, the american ones are boring and bland, the swedish are odd, the british are questionable, but Soviets designs are like art.
One of my all time favorites from western sides is the AV-8B Harrier, I don't like the Harrier as british made, but the redesigned AV-8B with Boeing.
But regardless of that, I pick Yak-38 over it anytime.
I like this guy's disarmingly honest approach .....
Well, OK a couple of times I *did* start take off procedures with the wings still swept back
(Which would have bored a hole in the perimeter fence not a whole lot later)
In counterpoint, stories abound of folk actually taking off with concrete tie down blocks still attached to wings, so hey.
Yet again, knocked out of the park!
Thanks Julian.
Of course another member of the "4 Greens Club" is the Harrier - main-wheel, nose-wheel, and two outriggers. 😃
Excellent interview. Very interesting indeed. Colonel Sumit is a real gentleman as well as an expert fighter pilot.
Great interview as usual. Would love to see a swing wing type attempting a take-off with wings fully swept! I did read of a B-1B having to land with wings fully swept some time ago! Had to divert to a base with a longer runway and ended up with blown tyres!!!
Cheers mate.
Brilliant interview as always! Thank you for interviewing this legend 🙏👍
Great to hear these vivid experiences.
This was a wonderful interview. Thank you
Cheers
I watched a documentary the other day which mentioned that firing the gun on the 27 had a habit of damaging the aircraft, especially the electronics in the cockpit due to the excessive vibration. If that's true no wonder it was scary to fire . . .
India actually lost a MiG 27 during Kargil war due to that. It was commanded by Flt Lt Nachiketa
Another great interview!👍
Thanks Ray.
I think Sumit is a rock star. Just look at all those what I think are guitar straps hanging from the door, not to mention the guitars 🎸
He is indeed.
And the CD albums on the wall...
Great interview!
Thank you.
AWESOME!
Thanks
Understood to be a very tricky airplane to fly with a very high pilot workload...
Oh that means one of the smart student from TsAGI finish his design project by combining Sweptwing body design of F111 and air intakes design of F4 with Mig 21 avionics 😝
yes and maybe he was simultaneously an intern at the KGB
What about the -25 interview ?
Out this Sunday
Always fun to hear from Indian pilots but a shame we get to hear from contemporary guys so little. Would be interesting to see some guys that have flown the SU-30, LCA, ALH, LCH etc
That will not be too easy to come by, IAF Pilots tend to be discreet speaking about current a/c.
But if you do want to get some flavour of all that: check out the YT channel of "Blue Skies Podcast".
Respect to the Gentleman stating his experience, however I have some questions related to the IAF:
1. Why were they and still are too many types of fighters in IAF service?
2. They were Jaguars doing ground attack why was the need to induct a similar role Mig-27. Both aircrafts are of similar generation and some how inducted at the same time as well.
3. In the High low capabilities aircraft, Mig-29 was inducted along with Mirage 2000. Still in low side we can see Mig-23 and Mig-21. Wasn't there a logistical issue because of it?
4. As the gentleman saying that Mig-23 was not a good dog fighter, so why was it inducted. You still had the Mirage 2000 and Mig-21. What was the philosophy to induct Mig-23?
5. Were the bases specialized for only Western or Russian designs or they could handle both types?
6. A more modern times question, Western and Russian designs are not capable to data link cross type. Isn't this a limitation?
1. India is a non-aligned country, with good relations with France, USA, Russia, Israel and Brazil, who make most of the aviation equipment used today and back then. Inducting multiple types is more of a safety feature, in that if relations with one country sour, India can continue with others.
2. Jaguars were slower, and had extremely poor performance at higher attitudes. The MiG-27 did not have such problems, and proved to be useful in Kargil. Jags are more suited for NoE flying, and IAF kept the Jaguar as it is one of the few aircraft capable of performing a nuclear strike role with a reasonable chance of success.
3. MiG-21 and -23 are far inferior to the Mirage 2000 and MiG-29. The Mirage and MiG-29 were bought to counter Pakistan's purchase of F-16s. Pakistani F-16s did not have BVR capability. While the MiG-23 carries SARH missiles, it simply cannot compete in a dogfight. Having a MiG-29 or Mirage 2000 gave IAF both BVR and close combat supremacy until Pakistan got the AMRAAM years later. Logistics are a nightmare, but the advantages were too great.
4. At that time, USA was supporting Pakistan. France had very inferior missiles. The USSR was India's only choice. The MiG-23 was inducted a year before the Mirage 2000. And like I mentioned, the MiG-21 was an entire generation behind (legacy MiG-21, not the current MiG-21Bison, which is upgraded to 4th gen standards).
5. Most IAF bases are western standard. Fully paved. Very few operational air bases are unpaved, I can think of only one, and only transport aircraft are flown there.
6. Datalink capabilities are classified as far as I know, but IAF jets have had ODL, or Operational Data Link since 2009. It's again, all classified but IAF is said to be a fully network-enabled force. MiG-29s conducted a simulation exercise and was live broadcasted in an event in Delhi. Indian Navy already had the ODL back in 1987, when they inducted the Tu-142M. Right now, IAF is working on a universal datalink for all its platforms called Vayulink. It's been developed and demonstrated at AeroIndia 2023, but I'm not sure of its current operational status.
It was the shortcomings of MiG-23 that compelled IAF to go for the Mirage and later the Fulcrum.The Floggers were inducted in '78-'79.
Curious about what missiles the Indians use, Russian or also Western? And how they compare their efficiency?
They have an interesting mix of Western, Russian, Israeli and Indian built weapons on the MKI.
R73, R77, MICA, Python, Astra, Exocet, Meteor etc.
Both
What is DACT? Dissimilar Air Combat Training?
Yep
Excellent. My dad Group Captain HSA Kumar was also commissioned in the IAF in 1972 as a fighter pilot. He flew the Gnats and Mig21s. He used to say exactly the same things about the Mig21, that it was a fighter pilots aircraft and it felt like you were strapped to a rocketship. Everything happened in fast forward. After the migs when he flew the Mirage 2000s, it felt like a video game. Too easy😂
Should be interesting, I've heard accounts and opinions that say the Mig-23 was the worst plane to ever enter wide service.
It wasn’t very popular even in IAF. But was it the worst? Compared to F100 Super Sabre or F104? I highly doubt it. The problem was more with it’s weapons package than the plane itself. However, the plane itself had issues, as Sumit pointed out regarding the landing gear. It’s not a plane average pilots can comfortably use.
@@dragonstormdipro1013 The interview that leaps to mind is one of an F-111 pilot who upon flying alongside A Mig-23 to test against said surprised "Yes there is A plane that handles worse than the F-111" It had to do with American project running migs out of Groom Lake.
That was one of ours with Jeff Guinn.
@@AKlover Tahat was their account after testing the first production type, the S model and the reputation stuck. In the meantime, the soon upgraded M (or its export version MF) is a different beast. Suffice to say it was capable of pulling 8g turns and outaccelerating about anything in transsonic range, including the f-15. The latest incarnation, the ML, was lighter than the MF and had even a slightly more powerful engine. One interesting fact - it is a turbojet, and its max trust with reheat is about 12,5 KN, but at sea level and speeds of around M 0.9 it actually produces about 16KN of trust. Hence the insane acceleration.