logoalt Hacker News

jterrystoday at 12:09 AM2 repliesview on HN

This actually begs the question...why the fuck would they use THESE for an airshow? They're aesthetically identical to F18 from a ground silhouette perspective. They blew through some really expensive planes from a much smaller fleet for a pony show that any regular F18 could've been part of.


Replies

jmward01today at 2:28 AM

They do training all day every day in these planes. Air shows are probably less exciting than the stuff they practice to do. Also, while they a generically '18's' they are EA-18g's and possibly have enough differences to require maintaining a separate NATOPs check from the other variants. (never flown one so I don't actually know though :). Either way, other than the blue angles who can't be everywhere and don't represent the diversity of platforms out in the fleet, there really aren't dedicated airshow aircraft out there.

kube-systemtoday at 1:18 AM

These were locally stationed, just over the border in Washington. The Blue Angels are in Florida today.

show 1 reply