Photo: USAF/Airman 1st Class Hiram Martinez
After a significant amount of time spent covering photos of military gear in action, you’d think we’d have gotten used to just how insanely beautiful and detailed these shots are. Then this one comes along and there you have it, instant awe again.
The wallpaper-quality photo you’re looking at now was snapped back in late August, but only recently made public by the U.S. Air Force (USAF). It shows an F-15E Strike Eagle over the beautiful blue and green northeastern United States, moments after it finished filling its tanks with the help of a KC-135 Stratotanker.
That’s probably where the airman holding the camera was seated when the pic was snapped. And it’s so detailed that just the tiniest amount of zoom reveals every wrinkle on the airplane’s skin, the USAF logos on the wings, and the missiles and rockets attached to its wings.
You even get to see the heads of the unnamed pilot and co-pilot sitting in the cockpit, with both of them looking straight at the camera, as if told someone was snapping a pic of their ride.
As for the plane itself, it’s one of the stars of the current USAF arsenal. Based on the 1970s F-15A, the F-15E entered service with the 405th Tactical Training Wing in 1988.
The plane is a two-seater powered by a pair of Pratt & Whitney turbofan engines with afterburners capable of generating 29,000 pounds of thrust each. The units burn so hot they can push the plane to top speeds of Mach 2.5, making it one of the fastest military birds around, and to altitudes that can reach 60,000 feet (18,288 meters).
At the time of writing, with the last numbers provided back in 2019, the USAF has 219 such planes in its inventory. The price for each one in fiscal year 98 constant dollars was $31.1 million.
That’s probably where the airman holding the camera was seated when the pic was snapped. And it’s so detailed that just the tiniest amount of zoom reveals every wrinkle on the airplane’s skin, the USAF logos on the wings, and the missiles and rockets attached to its wings.
You even get to see the heads of the unnamed pilot and co-pilot sitting in the cockpit, with both of them looking straight at the camera, as if told someone was snapping a pic of their ride.
As for the plane itself, it’s one of the stars of the current USAF arsenal. Based on the 1970s F-15A, the F-15E entered service with the 405th Tactical Training Wing in 1988.
The plane is a two-seater powered by a pair of Pratt & Whitney turbofan engines with afterburners capable of generating 29,000 pounds of thrust each. The units burn so hot they can push the plane to top speeds of Mach 2.5, making it one of the fastest military birds around, and to altitudes that can reach 60,000 feet (18,288 meters).
At the time of writing, with the last numbers provided back in 2019, the USAF has 219 such planes in its inventory. The price for each one in fiscal year 98 constant dollars was $31.1 million.
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