Here’s How They Do Maintenance on the F-16 Fighting Falcon

Being machines, these military assets need, of course, maintenance, and that generally takes place behind closed doors, as really, what can be exciting about an airplane on the ground, for instance, being tampered with?

Well, a look at the 8-minutes or so video below might change your opinion on that, as it shows what an F-16 Fighting Falcon goes through while not in the air.

The video was published by the Military in Action YouTube channel, the same guys that brought us the mighty Panzerhaubitze 2000 firing its shells in a tremendous display of power. It shows an F-16 shortly after landing, being towed inside a hangar where engineers and pilots start having a thorough look at it. The video was shot by Staff Sergeant Kenneth Brown and Master Sergeant Matt Hecht, but we are not being told which unit the airplane belongs to.

The F-16 Fighting Falcon, also known as the Viper on account of some connections some pilots see with the Colonial Viper starfighter from Battlestar Galactica, is a General Dynamics (now Lockheed Martin) machine that was inducted into service in 1978.

During the time that has passed since, over 4,500 of them were made (and for a military airplane in times of peace, that is a lot) and is now operated by some 25 countries. The entire fleet of Vipers flew over 13 million sorties for an estimated 19.5 million flight hours.

The single Pratt & Whitney engine on the plane comes with 29,000 lb of thrust, more than enough to take it to speeds of over Mach 2 (1,534 mph/2,469 kph). The airplane’s range is around 2,620 miles (4,217 km), a distance it could easily cover in a little under two hours at full speed.