A-4 Skyhawk vs Mirage III

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 24 Sep 2020, 21:54

DRAKEN A-4Ns as Aggressors/Adversaries for French Navy story (with info about former RNZAF Macchi 339s included) six page PDF from AIR INTERNATIONAL magazine October 2020 The Faux Foe - French Aggressors by Henri-Pierre Grolleau

mixelflick · by **mixelflick** » 25 Sep 2020, 12:33

Have to go with the A-4 here, given its ability to perform well in both roles (air to air, air to ground/sea). The Argentinians used it to great effect IMO, although many fell to Sea Harriers. I think with better training and carrying an equivalent missile (AIM-9L), it would have been killer.

If I'm not mistaken, several dumb bombs dropped by A-4's (rockeye's?) hit British warships, but failed to explode. Their low level work around Port Stanley was impressive...

Gums · by **Gums** » 26 Sep 2020, 03:22

Salute!

@ mixel

One troop from Falklands can talk about the fracas. A Harrier dude.

See prune military forums. Very oriented toward RAF and navy, but they let me contribute now and then.

Look for callsign: mogwi

=========

Like A-4, but small tail Block 10 Viper should be best overall. Jez my opinion.

Gums sez....

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 03 Oct 2020, 14:02

EXERCISE SOBERANIA [5 page PDF of story + photos attached below]
Oct-Dec 2020 REPORT AND IMAGES BY HORACIO J. CLARIÁ

"The Argentine Air Force (FAA) conducted the exercise "Soberania 2019" from 10 to 14 November [2019]....

Caption of Photos: "Armed with a live AIM-9M Sidewinder air-to-air missile this A-4AR Firehawk taxies to the runway for take-off for the first launch of a live Sidewinder since the 30 A-4AR Firehawk entered service in 1997."

Source: THE AVIATION MAGAZINE October - December 2020

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 15 Oct 2020, 16:22

"Draken has been working with the 57th Adversary Tactics Group at Nellis AFB, Nevada, since late 2015, with a mix of ex-
Royal New Zealand Air Force A-4Ks (seen here is N145EM, formerly NZ6215; formerly A4G 871; formerly USN A-4F BuNo 155052 - photo by Joe Copalman" AirForces Monthly Magazine Nov 2020

energo · by **energo** » 17 Oct 2020, 01:18

spazsinbad wrote: Royal New Zealand Air Force A-4Ks (seen here is N145EM, formerly NZ6215; formerly A4G 871; formerly USN A-4F BuNo 155052 - photo by Joe Copalman" AirForces Monthly Magazine Nov 2020

Awesome. IMO one of the most photogenic jets still around. Huge pitty I've never seen one up close. :bang:

F-16ADF · by **F-16ADF** » 22 Jan 2021, 16:16

A-4M's of the USMC.

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 14 Mar 2021, 19:26

Former A4G 871 (see story above) is now looking a little different in 'disruptive camouflage'? BOGIE scheme is DRAKEN's.

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 27 Mar 2021, 10:05

Every now and then A4G pilot bios are posted at this Oz RAN History website. Here is one with a quotable quote for USN.

"...During that deployment Barry had the opportunity to cross-deck onto the nuclear powered aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, an experience he was to enjoy immensely. On recalling his first catapult launch from the deck of the ‘Big E’ Barry was to remark that “I almost ejected because it was so soft compared to what I was used to [on Melbourne], I was totally impressed with the whole operation”.
Conversely, a USN pilot who cross-decked to HMAS Melbourne was to liken his experience on the much smaller aircraft carrier as “having to land on a postage stamp when he was used to landing on the envelope”, a testimony to the skill of the RAN pilots.

https://www.navy.gov.au/biography/lieut ... arry-evans

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 06 Jun 2021, 02:04

8 page PDF from Combat Aircraft Journal July 2021 Volume 22 No 7 HAIL THE SUPER SCOOTER

HAIL THE SUPER SCOOTER
Jul 2021 Bertie Simmonds

"...Inside the diminutive attack aircraft, the conditions were cramped – you basically ‘wore’ the A-4 (named Skyhawk officially in February 1954)...."
...A-4 SKYHAWK: A PILOT’S VIEW
David ‘Frosty’ Olson earned his Naval Aviator wings in August 1969 and, as well as being a Vought Corsair II pilot, spent a lot of time in the cockpit of the A-4 as an adversary pilot.

He said: “The A-4 was a small aircraft and had a small cockpit. I flew the A-4 after several years flying the larger A-7 and, being six-feet one, the first few flights felt like putting a size 11 foot into a size eight shoe! One of my friends told me of bombing ‘up north’ in Vietnam in heavy flak, he’d turn sideways in the cockpit to reduce frontal area to shrapnel.

“Several of the more senior pilots during my early career had flown the A-4 in Vietnam: they liked it because it was a pretty stable platform, good power response (turbojet not turbofan) and it could take damage: with lost hydraulics the pilot could manually disconnect the hydraulics and still control the aircraft with flight control cables to ailerons, rudder, and elevator. [this aspect has been glossed over somewhat - flight control hydraulics lost was not an easy flight control - basically slow straight & level perhaps a slight descent for landing at a higher than usual speed - LARGE MUSCLES were REQUIRED]

“Adversary in the A-4 was fun, even if it came down to one of two outcomes: the flat scissors and the rolling scissors. We would pull into vertical forcing the overshoot.

“As the other pilot pulled up, we would continue into a sort of loop, roll over at a very slow airspeed using rudder to push the A-4 back down. If we could point our nose at the other aircraft we could get a high deflection shot, up to a head-on shot. Of course, we were losing energy (speed and altitude) the whole time we did this.

“An A-4 was great in a slow fight (the ‘phone booth’) but lacked the thrust-to-weight of a modern fighter with afterburner. So our training was to emulate slow speed fighter performance. Adversary flying was fun, but fraught with dangers. Here are a few examples...

“Those wing slats would extend simultaneously as the angle of attack (AoA) became high enough. Asymmetric slat extension was, well, ‘special’ as it slammed one’s helmeted head into the canopy. On one such occasion, during an aggressive, high-G turn, one slat extended asymmetrically. I immediately went nose down into a tight spiral – yes, I thought I was going to die… My opponent could only gulp, ‘are you OK?’ “In a two-versus-one, two aircraft may enter a horizontal scissors and the third will attempt to close for a firing solution. The problem is the turning aircraft are flying near stall and forward velocity is real slow.

“From the perch, the third aircraft will attempt to enter at speeds twice to three times that of the others. In one case, I was in the back seat of the TA-4. As our slow speed scissors progressed, something in the back of my mind kicked in. ‘Where is the other guy?’ I looked over my shoulder. “Oh crap, he was coming in way too hot. He pulled into us and directly in front. I took the stick and pushed it full forward. The last thing I recall was his wing-plan filling the windscreen…

”I had the same when flying against an F-16 flown by the USAF’s Safety General! As he approached from behind, no one had told him about the A-4’s ability to really tighten the turn, forcing the overshoot. He watched in horror as we disappeared under his nose and he hit our jet-wake. ‘My God, did we hit the little guy?’ he exclaimed.

”He asked if he’d violated the 500 feet ‘Rules of Engagement’. ‘Yeah, kinda,’ mumbled we more junior types. “Finally, there was the Super Fox – with a big, 12,000lb thrust motor and nearly one-to-one thrust to weight. The standard A-4 could allow near to slight Mach-plus flight, but in reality even in a dive it couldn’t. [DEPENDS... an A4G with 9,300 lb thrust could do M 1.1 in a dive when clean (I did it in a very steep dive with large empty drop tanks chasing a Mirage IIIO)] But the Super Fox – oh boy! I pushed it up and up and as I neared 0.9 Mach I encountered a violent back-and-forth yawing. [this happened to me with the drop tanks as described above but did not happen IF CLEAN - The TA4G was temperamental about this - the dive had to be steeper than an A4G and some days it just would not go supersonic clean]

“In my mind, the vivid picture of an F-4 many years before that disintegrated from pilot-induced oscillations at Mach entered my mind – I figured that was the end of my adventure pushing that particular envelope.

”Another lesson learned!

”With the Super Fox you could accelerate to 450kts, pull up into a loop and then roll out at the top and pull up into a second loop – but you were pretty slow at the top.

“The adversary squadron was the apotheosis of my naval aviation career before I became an Air Boss on the USS Enterprise and in the last months we got some Northrop F-5s from TOPGUN as they had moved over to the newer F/A-18.

”While I mention ‘Top Gun’, that movie created quite a nice image for us adversary pilots: we had red stars on our patches and had become legends in our own minds…”

Source: Combat Aircraft Journal July 2021 Volume 22 No 7

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 06 Jun 2021, 22:01

A-4 SKYHAWK: A PILOT’S VIEW 5 page PDF made from above story in Combat Aircraft Journal July 2021

spazsinbad · by **spazsinbad** » 28 Jun 2021, 05:02

First minute of 2 minute video clips shows A4Gs aboard HMAS Melbourne with USMC AV-8As at TOWNSVILLE QLD?

Australia: Australia, New Zealand And American Forces Combine For Anzus Pact Exercise Condenamed 'Kangaroo Two'. 1976

https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA ... MBINE-FOR/

Corsair1963 · by **Corsair1963** » 28 Jun 2021, 07:11

I've had the pleasure of meeting a number of former Skyhawk Pilots. All first rate and spoke highly of the Scooter....

Including the late Senator John McCain and Randy Cunningham. The latter Commanded VF-126 that operated the A4E/M in the Aggressor Role. Sadly, I spoke to him very briefly and not about his time flying the Scooter.

outlaw162 · by **outlaw162** » 28 Jun 2021, 14:29

....not about his time flying the Scooter.

Legal advice?

Corsair1963 · by **Corsair1963** » 08 Jul 2021, 05:27

Marines Had An “Aircraft Carrier On Land” With Catapults And Arresting Gear In Vietnam

Built from scratch, Chu Lai Air Base in South Vietnam was in the thick of exactly where tactical airpower was needed.

By Thomas Newdick July 7, 2021

During the long conflict in Southeast Asia, U.S. Marines Corps jets regularly flew from bases on land in direct support of troops on the ground. However, only one of the airbases that the service operated from in South Vietnam was actually outfitted with arrester wires and even catapult launch gear. This was at Chu Lai, where the Marines built themselves what was basically a land-based “aircraft carrier” that was utilized by A-4 Skyhawk light attack jets and, later, F-4 Phantom II fighters.

The story of Chu Lai Air Base is inseparable from that of the A-4’s service during the Vietnam War, where it was, quite rightly, recognized as one of the signature aircraft of the conflict. U.S. Navy and Marine Corps Skyhawks bore a significant brunt of the air war for the first half of the conflict. In the process, pilots routinely flew into harm’s way on unglamorous missions, and the A-4 eventually accounted for more than a third of all Navy fixed-wing combat losses—Marine attrition rates were similar....................

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4 ... in-vietnam