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Enthusiast Joined: Dec 18, 2003 Posts: 34 Status: Offline

Quote:

The 57th Adversary Tactics Group undertook some interesting tactics not contained in the overall [scripted] intelligence scenario. These involved surprise threats, generally Red Air [enemy] fighters, entering the air battle unexpectedly. White Force [exercise control] staff would confirm that the threat was Red and Blue Air [the “good guys”] had to react. The tactic worked. An F-16C pilot assigned to the 64th Aggressor Squadron gained the first-ever F-22 kill in Red Flag. [94th commander] Lt. Col. Dirk Smith told AFM: “At least half of the 94th FS crews had less than 50 hours in the F-22 and no matter how magical the F-22, any pilot can make a mistake. The beauty of Red Flag is that we were able to go out and practice our tactics in a challenging scenario, make a mistake, learn a lesson, and be that much better prepared for actual combat.

Full article: http://warisboring.com/?p=387

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Elite 1K Joined: Jul 20, 2005 Posts: 1035 Status: Offline

Yeah...this is REALLY old news!

checksixx wrote:

Yeah...this is REALLY old news!

The article is dated 10 July 07...

Active Member Joined: Nov 22, 2004 Posts: 134

Sure, any aircraft can be shot down, depending on the circumstances and tactics. I don't think that anyone has ever denied this. This blog entry definitely seemed to be biased against the F-22, however, implying that the "most controlled circumstances" means that the F-22 has always been given the advantage until now, which is hardly the case. In fact, its stealth advantage is often compromised during training by ground control giving the F-22s' coordinates, obtained via telemetry data, to the aggressors, which would obviously not be the case in real combat. The truth is that in the usual training scenarios, the F-22 dominates against highly skilled aggressors, while pilots in legacy fighters often must struggle very hard in comparison. The F-22 also continues to dominate in training scenarios that would be hopeless for any other fighter.

The pilot of the F-22 that was "shot down" had not properly accounted for a "downed" aggressor that had "regenerated" in a favorable position--he had mistakenly believed that this fighter was still out of the game. This aspect of exercises such as Red Flag is not realistic in and of itself, but is a practical way to simulate a greater number of threat aircraft and perhaps other aspects of the "fog of war," in which it can be very easy to lose track of what you're doing or end up dead because of rotten luck. So what should the pilot of the "downed" F-22 learn from this incident that he could apply to real combat? Well, it certainly wouldn't be "Watch out for downed enemy fighters regenerating." Smile

Realistically, this was mental practice for managing one's situational awareness under complex, stressful conditions, which will hopefully generally translate to the aspects of real combat that are not easy or possible to accurately simulate in training. At the very least, this is a reminder for F-22 pilots to stay alert and focused, and that's a good thing.

What this does not do, however, is point out any previously unknown flaws or weaknesses in the F-22 itself, which everyone should know has its limitations. If you can somehow get close enough, then you can track it on radar, sure, and if the pilot ignores you because he thinks you're dead for some strange reason, then you might just get yourself a Raptor kill. Well, congratulations, stuff happens, but if you had to go to war today, would you rather be in one or go against them?

Elite 1K Joined: Jul 20, 2005 Posts: 1035 Status: Offline

Delta wrote:

checksixx wrote:

Yeah...this is REALLY old news!

The article is dated 10 July 07...

Attention to detail is a critical skill....re-read the first paragraph.

Elite 1K Joined: Apr 26, 2004 Posts: 1215 Status: Offline

Hey Check...Shack on that one..........you are correct!!!!!!

Enthusiast Joined: Dec 18, 2003 Posts: 34 Status: Offline

Article update 7/11/07:

Quote:

"The folks over at the Alert5 blog believe this represents the second simulated F-22 kill, not the first. The first, they say, occured a year ago during a mock dogfight between a Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet and a Raptor, most likely from the 27th Fighter Squadron. They’ve even got a picture to “prove” it."

Commenters over at Danger Room contest Alert5's assertion:

Quote:

“A lot of people I know still want to know more about the pedigree/authenticity of that ‘pic’ at alert5.com,” writes SMSgt Mac. ”Without some decent expanation behind it (not one has appeared since it came out a while back that I’m aware of) it doesn’t pass the smell test … which is why it has never had the requisite street cred to use as a stick to poke the AF with.”

“The Super Hornet gun shot was real,” elp replies. “However, it was in an unsafe setup. One which both parties realize could have ended up as a mid-air.”

“I don’t think most people assume it was a Photoshop job,” says SMSgt Mac. ”The questions are more about the scenario/conditions [in which] it was taken. Number one question in my mind (given the display info) was: had the Raptor already ‘knocked it off’ because the engagement was degenerating into an unsafe situation? The data looks more like the ‘attacker’ is more ‘falling’ on the ‘target’ than anything else, while inside the typical hard separation limit.”

In other words, the photo wasn’t shot during a legit mock dogfight, rather after a dogfight, when the F-22 wasn’t playing anymore. Not that the Super Hornet isn’t a kickass fighter.

ej

Elite 1K Joined: Jul 20, 2005 Posts: 1035 Status: Offline

See: F-22 Loss at Red Flag http://www.f-16.net/f-16_forum_viewtopic-t-7605.html

Hornet snap shot story:

The following was posted by Dozer on fencecheck.com and should clear up anything regarding this incident...Check

Quoting Dozer-- "The Hornet "snap" shot - good story. Happened here at Langley. It was a stock, combat configured F-22 flying a BFM (dogfighting) sortie against an airshow configured, i.e. squeeky clean, not combat configured or loaded, Super Hornet (not at all representative of how it performs with 8 pylons, an EA pod and 4-6 or missiles hanging off the rails and probably a fuel tank or two or their out of gas real quick...). It started from a 9000 foot line abreast 300 knot setup (which AF pilots never fly) where they turned into each other at the "fights on" call. It's not a scenario we fly because we never find ourselves in those parameters, we try to set up realistic parameters we expect to see in combat - otherwise the lessons learned aren't applicable and while it might be fun it's not a good use of scarce training time (I don't know if that's a setup the Navy flies or it might just have been a quick attempt to get a last engagement in if they were low on gas - I don't have that info). The Hornet pilot gave up everything he had to point at the Raptor and take a snap shot - it was NOT a tracking shot (stabilized and enough bullets to cause a kill), it was about 2 or 3 frames (many more required to cause a kill - OK - for you skeptics there's always the golden BB but let me finish first...). The AF pilot honored the training rules we're all supposed to abide by, they've been written in blood because pilots have been killed in these scenarios so our training rules look to prevent those scenarios by causing guys to quit manuevering for the shot to prevent a mid-air collision. With greater than a 135 aspect angle and inside of 9000 feet we're supposed to avoid pure or lead pursuit to avoid that head on collision, inside that range at our tactical speeds there's not enough time to react to prevent a collision once you realize it's going to happen. The Navy pilot completely blew off that rule, the AF pilot honored it, the Navy pilot pulled lead pursuit all the way into the high aspect (greater than the 135 degree gun shot rule) snap shot, the AF pilot lagged off to prevent the mid-air collision potential, the Navy pilot was still on the trigger inside the 1000 foot rule (we're supposed to avoid getting inside of 1000 feet from each other to also help prevent mid-air collisions), attempting to get the snap shot, he's inside the 1000 foot range with the trigger on, flies within about 200 feet of the Raptor (remember who's backed off to honor the training rules), and dang near kills himself and the Raptor pilot and causing what would have been one of the worst fighter to fighter disasters in recorded history. I've had that happen twice to me when I was flying the Eagle as a weapons officer (close enough to hear very loud engine noise and I figured I was dead both times, but God wasn't ready to take me yet), and both times I knocked off the fight, made the guy fly home, busted him on the ride and he had to explain to me and the boss why he was being stupid. That is the ONLY gun shot video I have ever heard of or seen from ANY Hornet engagement, ever. And it was a hugely B.S. and completely boneheaded act as you can see from the actual circumstances. In the real world - the Hornet never saw the Raptor and he was dead w/o ever knowing what hit him - that's the cold hard truth, like it or not - sorry if you're a Hornet fan but that's how all of our engagements with Hornets, Tomcats, Eagles, Vipers, etc. have gone. You would be amused if I had time to tell you how the hundreds of engagements went I've had with aircraft of all types, the biggest problem we have now is getting anyone to fly with us because they get no training, they never see us and they just die. Unless we promise to do some within visual range manuevering with them where we start and can see each other at the start, no one (Navy or AF) wants to fly vs. the Raptor anymore - that alone ought to tell you what the truth is."

That pretty much covers the 22 gun kill (in my best top gun voice).

That's all I have to say about that. (in my best Forrest Gump voice)

Enthusiast Joined: May 31, 2007 Posts: 29 Status: Offline

That'll do pig... That'll do.

Newbie Joined: Jan 07, 2007 Posts: 6 Status: Offline

I keep imagining the Superbug pilot in a bar somewhere quoting lines from 'Dragon, the Bruce Lee story'...

"I beat him before, I'll beat him again!"

no..
it was col. Toon in that super bug
heard it talk about it in Saigon last month...
it was a SPECIAL F-18 too, equip with sweden gun aiming from the VIGGEN.

Thus endeth the lesson

checksixx wrote:

Delta wrote:

checksixx wrote:

Yeah...this is REALLY old news!

The article is dated 10 July 07...

Attention to detail is a critical skill....re-read the first paragraph.

Touche.

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First Ever F-22 Raptor "Shot Down"