Posted on 11/05/2014 6:09:32 PM PST by sukhoi-30mki
An incredible air-to-air engagement, where one U.S. pilot alone survived to six North Vietnamese MiGs. A true milestone in the progress of naval aviation, the Vought F-8 has been one of the few carrier-based fighters that could outperform most land-based counterparts.
Being the first genuinely supersonic naval aircraft, the Crusader, was a single seat, single engine swept fighter that introduced an unusual feature, the variable incidence wing. Armed with four Colt Mk 12 cannons, the F-8 was called “The last gunfighter”: these guns combined with its high thrust-to-weight ratio and with its good maneuverability, made of the Crusader a good dogfighter.
The Crusader showed its ability in close combat during the Vietnam war, especially on Dec. 14, 1967: in fact, as explained by Barrett Tilman and Henk van der Lugt in their book “VF-11/111 Sundowners”, on that day, Lt. Cdr. Richard “Brown Bear” Schaffert (the VF-111 Sundowners operation officer during the 1967 deployment onboard the CV-34 USS Oriskany), were involved in an aerial combat which became a classic dogfight of the jet age, even if did not result in any MiG kill.
Schaffert was escorting an A-4E Skyhawk, piloted by Lt Charles Nelson, tasked in an Iron Hand anti-SAM (Surface to Air Missile) mission in the area between Hanoi and Haiphong, when “Brown Bear” saw two MiG-17s (“Fresco” based on NATO designation).
Schaffert immediately started a descent from 18,000 ft and when he recovered at 3,000 ft, he looked for Nelson but he found two more MiGs. Having lost the sight of the A-4E, Brown Bear understood that he had to rely on his 3500 hours of flight experience to face four bandits alone. He started the dogfight with an 8 Gs break forcing the first Fresco to overshoot, but Schaffert knew very well that he had to fight working in the vertical, since the F-8 couldn’t turn as fast as a MiG-17.
As it became obvious that the four bandits had split into two sections,Schaffert started a series of yo-yo maneuvers using the afterburner, trying to reach an advantage position against the MiGs, leaving the chance to Brown Bear to conduct the dogfight as a 1 vs 2 engagement.
Schaffert got a “good tone” from one of its Sidewinders, but the second pair of MiG-17s shot at him with their cannons and he had to perform three more yo-yos before launching a Sidewinder….which didn’t explode. Now he had only two missiles left since one of the four AIM-9s carried by the F-8 had already experienced a failure before take off.
Executing reversal maneuvers and pulling high Gs to defeat the superior turning radius of the MiG-17, Schaffert shot another missile which failed to explode.
Then, two MiGs fired a couple of IR-guided K-13 missiles (AA-2 Atoll as reported by NATO designation) which failed to get on target because they were launched out of the missile operative envelope. Brown Bear found himself once again in a good firing position but this time the guidance system of the last Sidewinder failed, leaving Schaffert with only the rounds of his plane’s four Colt cannons.
After another 5 Gs turn, he had a good tracking solution on a MiG but when he pulled the trigger, all the four 20 mm cannons…choked!
The problem was caused by a common defect of Crusader cannons: the pneumatic ammunition feed system disconnected after high-Gs maneuvers.
Two MiG-21s joined the air combat firing two more Atolls missiles, which Brown Bear was able to avoid.
Facing six adversaries, Schaffert started another series of high altitude yo-yos and engaged the enemy leader in a vertical rolling scissors; once he had reached the bottom of the maneuver, he accelerated towards the coast leaving the enemy behind. He returned safely to the USS Oriskany with almost no fuel left.
Despite the fact that Brown Bear didn’t shoot down any enemy fighter, he left an important lesson to Topgun instructors: how to survive in a dogfight alone against six MiGs, a good lecture to give to the Fighter Weapons School students in the following years.
https://www.google.com/#q=jetfighter+3+download
“free download” on first link, I would not trust that site
Velocity made the game you mentioned, it was also released by Mission Studios and then it was all bought by Take Two Interactive. The company that made Grand Theft Auto owns the rights to it I guess.
Growing up in a Navy town at the height of the Vietnam War, I used to sit out on my porch and watch these birds and countless A-4s and A-6s fly right down our street into the landing pattern. Later, the A-4s gave way to A-7s and the F-8s gave way to F-4s....I fondly recall one morning though at the beach and looking across the Bay to San Francisco when a division of F-8s came streaking by at maybe 200 AGL...never forget that sight...
He flew F-8s, but I think he was shot down while flying an A-4.
The guys who made the cannons and missiles must have made the early torpedoes in WW2 (they failed to explode).
Dunno quite what you are talking about, but if you had ever seen the rotating drum feed trays of 20mm the gun pod used, that had to be synched perfectly with the gun, it was a clusterf**k. Hughes Aircraft really sold the navy a pig in a poke with that one.
Never got to work with the miniguns the army had. Had an army gunship stop at our forward rearm pad and ask us to fix their gun. We just looked at each other. Give us a day or three and we could figure it out, we were ordnance guys after all. We did stock minigun ammo and it was highly prized as primo 7.62 belted stuff.
And after a hot lz, the ham and lima was hot enough for hot chow!
Love to give the game a try. Another game I liked was Gunship 2000 where if you had all your helos in formation as you attack your assigned target, I like it on how all the various missiles would just fly off in all directions. I remember the Iraq scenarioes where you sometimes see mosques pop up in your targeting system, the downside is it took two Hellfires or TOWS to take those out plus it is worth a good laugh to go cow or camel hunting. B-) BTW, flying the AH-66 Comanche was fun too.
A lot of good meomories and a few sad ones of crew lost stateside and in RVN.
RIP MIA Cpt. Gary Fors, you are not forgotten. You were a great buddy to us in the ordnance shop.
The Man With No Name survived everyth....
Oh, wait a minute.
Never mind.
You are right - my error: Sorry. He flew the A4E when he was shot down. I remember reading a book he wrote about his experiences; he said he spent a tremendous amount of time and energy ensuring his squadron was sea-worthy for the Viet Nam war.
You are right - my error: Sorry. He flew the A4E when he was shot down. I remember reading a book he wrote about his experiences; he said he spent a tremendous amount of time and energy ensuring his squadron was sea-worthy for the Viet Nam war.
I served with D troop 1/10 Cav "Shamrocks" 67-68-69 (”The eyes and ears of the 4th Div) ....Im guessing we crossed paths many a time....Several sites but here;s a couple of em... http://d-1-10thcav-vietnam.com .... http://theoriginaldtroop.webplus.net //
I'm talking Lo-Tech here....lol.....I flew Hughes OH-6 helicopters for awhile and they came equipped with a mini gun that was absolutely useless for an observation helicopter....another pig in a poke!...we gave the mini guns to the gunships and went back to the old tried and true M-60 hanging off a bungee cord (a can of C-rations fit perfectly onto the M-60 and made a perfect feed device!)
Gunship 2000 fit on a floppy disc didn’t it?
I really liked that game too
Almost didn't want to, though. His story about what he endured as a guest at the Hanoi Hilton hurts to read no matter who is telling it.
And what he endured as a VP candidate still makes me mad.
“aren’t we supposed to shoot at em at some point.”
There is an old poster in the cafeteria, probably from WWII, maybe Vietnam, at the Top Gun School “There are old pilots. There are bold pilots. But there are no old bold pilots.”
Mission one is coming home to fight another day.
Sucks when secondary missions fail, but that is the way it is.
I love John Wayne as much as the next guy, but despite his movie rolls, the traditional cowboy way is not the way to win a dogfight. More like Clint Eastwood in “Unforgiven.” Fight when you have to, but shooting them with a shotgun in the outhouse is better.
The Red Barron taught us this lesson, if you read up on him.
Thanks, unfortunately it’s like every other D/L of JF3, all demos, and over 360mb unzipped! One of these days...
Checked out the site.
We probably flew through the same air!
Did a lot of support for the 4th up and down highway 19, and up in the an lo valley areas.
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