Photo: USAF/Senior Airman Alex Miller
Some air forces in this world like to flaunt the flags of the nations they represent in full glory of the aircraft they fly, in various positions and in various sizes. Not us Americans, though, as we found other ways of signaling this or that aircraft is ours.
That means that, even if by sheer number the instances of American military aircraft in action outshines all competition, most of the time, these flying beasts do not brag of having originated in the land of the free and the home of the brave by wearing the American flag as we all know it on their bodies.
Sure, in the case of the F-22 Raptor, for instance, there’s little need for stars and stripes on the fuselage to identify who it belongs to. After all, it’s only the Americans that fly the fifth-generation airplane that met its untimely production demise. But one can’t stop from getting a feeling of pride when the Old Glory is somehow captured in the same pic with the F-22.
That’s exactly what a Senior Airman managed to do at the beginning of March, at the Heritage Flight Training and Certification Course at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona. It was there where an F-22 deployed with an unidentified unit was performing “aerial maneuvers during annual training,” and as soon as it was about to fly over one of the American flags at the base, was snapped for all eternity in one of the most beautiful such images recently released by the USAF.
Sadly, it’s unclear if we’ll get to see such instance for much longer. With under 200 of them having been made, and given the fact the plane is no longer in production, the F-22 is not on the short list for the Air Force’s streamlined fleet of aircraft, which only comprises the F-35, F-15EX, F-16, A-10, and the upcoming Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD).
Sure, in the case of the F-22 Raptor, for instance, there’s little need for stars and stripes on the fuselage to identify who it belongs to. After all, it’s only the Americans that fly the fifth-generation airplane that met its untimely production demise. But one can’t stop from getting a feeling of pride when the Old Glory is somehow captured in the same pic with the F-22.
That’s exactly what a Senior Airman managed to do at the beginning of March, at the Heritage Flight Training and Certification Course at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona. It was there where an F-22 deployed with an unidentified unit was performing “aerial maneuvers during annual training,” and as soon as it was about to fly over one of the American flags at the base, was snapped for all eternity in one of the most beautiful such images recently released by the USAF.
Sadly, it’s unclear if we’ll get to see such instance for much longer. With under 200 of them having been made, and given the fact the plane is no longer in production, the F-22 is not on the short list for the Air Force’s streamlined fleet of aircraft, which only comprises the F-35, F-15EX, F-16, A-10, and the upcoming Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD).
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