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USAF Pave Hawk Lands to Show Perfect Close-Up of a Hot Zone Machine

Born in the early 1980s, the HH-60G Pave Hawk variant of the Black Hawk quickly established itself as a reliable machine. Named so after on account of the PAVE electronics it incorporates, the helicopter has become an essential tool for troop insertion and extraction from hot zones, be it for combat or during rescue missions.
HH-60G Pave Hawk landing 9 photos
Photo: USAF/Senior Airman Hayden Legg
Jolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue HelicopterJolly Green II Rescue Helicopter
The helicopter can carry four crew at speeds of 221 mph (357 kph) and fly for as much as 373 miles (600 km). Because it was intended as a helicopter operating behind enemy lines, it comes equipped with machine guns, including the mighty M2 Browning.

The decades of service for the Pave Hawk are quickly coming to an end, as the USAF is planning to replace it with something fancier, the Vietnam-era named Jolly Green II. But that doesn’t mean the aircraft will no longer take to the sky, as it still has a lot to show.

For a while now the Air Force has been running something called heritage flights, bringing together “today's state-of-the-art” aircraft to fly in formation with vintage machines for all of us to enjoy. The Pave Hawk you see here is landing after completing one such heritage flight at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia back in June.

The aircraft is deployed with the 41st Rescue Squadron, a unit of the 347th Rescue Group that has been in the business of search and rescue missions since the early 1950s. The photo shows the moments after the flight the Pave Hawk took accompanied by the Jolly Green II, a flight that required a massive HC-130J Combat King II refueling the helicopters mid-air.

The aircraft that will be replacing the Pave Hawk, Jolly Green II, should come with double the range and the latest hardware in terms of defenses, weapons, and cyber-security.
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Editor's note: Gallery shows the Jolly Green II.

About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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