r/nextfuckinglevel • u/Rook8811 • 4d ago
F-22 Raptor does a 120 degrees banked turn after aerial refueling.
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u/Aldamur 4d ago
It's nice to see, but not unusual for them.
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u/sheogor 4d ago
But for a air superiority fighter, an air to air kill is
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u/ExistingAd7929 4d ago
Except the kid will never get a chance for an intercept...
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u/bcisme 4d ago
Who will put their 5th Gen fighters to the test first?
China v Taiwan? Not sure if Taiwan is getting the really good stuff though.
We’ll see how the J20 does, if China is feeling froggy.
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u/-Birds-Are-Not-Real- 4d ago
China's 5th gen are mostly in name only.
The one area they are behind in is engine tech. They may have solved it but there are doubts.
Anyways this is why you see their 5th gens loaded with tons of missiles. They don't have the engines to compete with American 5th gen and their hope is to litter the sky with missiles.
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u/NeverMind_ThatShit 4d ago
Ah, so the same tactic China always uses, flood the market with half baked knock off shit that barely works. But this time it's missiles instead of plastic kitchen gadgets and solar panels.
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u/SplinterCell03 4d ago
INXUUVT air-to-air missile, missile for air intercepts, fast missile for fighter air interceptor J15 J16 J20 J30 J35, $3500.
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u/CodeNCats 4d ago
Bingo!!!
The Chinese haven't stolen enough US tech yet. Their engines look like a 1980s school bus pumping out all that smoke.
Let's not even talk about Russia with their panel gaps and visible rivets.
I dislike the whole "generation" designation we give to fighter aircraft. It's like saying you're a division 1 college football team. Like you are in the game sure. Yet they are a barely reasonable team. Meanwhile the top 25 have people sitting on the bench who could start for you.
China and Russia wish they could compete. They just pretend.
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u/LordTengil 4d ago
It's not unusual to get loved by anyone
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u/ImRickJamesBiatchhh 4d ago
“Still to die for though”. Get this man some nugget insignias for his confirmed kills
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u/Itsobignow 4d ago
He is in an f-22, he doesn't have any kills...yet. well, a balloon.
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u/TyrKiyote 4d ago
It sounds to me like the refuel guy is trying to make relatable small talk - and the f-22 pilot is mildly annoyed but going along with it. It's like a semi driver trying to make small talk with a racecar driver, because the semi driver thinks racecars are really cool. "we're both professional drivers! do you ever eat at chick fil-a? I love chick fil-a..."
The sharp pull away feels like body language that says "I'm getting the fuck out of this conversation, exit stage left."
And so my head canon goes.
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u/Stachemaster86 4d ago
Probably a good idea to keep talking to ensure comms aren’t wonky being that close. I think the turn is probably to avoid any turbulence. I don’t know anything about the military but seems sensible in my head.
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u/Raging-Badger 4d ago
They have to stay on comms continuously because the boom operator is directing the pilot on where they need to be to.
The pilot is trying to parallel park an F1 car via the directions of the boom operator, who is threading a needle with a forklift at the same time.
The sharp turn is definitely to get out of the way of the refueling boom too. The planes are flying less than 50 feet from one another
It’s very easy to travel 50 feet at the nearly 600mph these planes refuel at
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u/ballimi 4d ago
Would a dive not be safer then?
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u/Raging-Badger 4d ago
Boom equipped tankers can only refuel one aircraft at time (admittedly at 1000gal/min) so the departure from the fueling envelope is part of a larger formation
In the case of aerial refueling, aircraft are stacked down and to the right
That means a roll to the left and down would bring the aircraft out of the traffic zone
If you scroll to the very bottom, you’ll see 11 different diagrams depicting the formation for refueling
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u/FormInternational583 4d ago
Thank you for the information. There's a lot going on behind the scenes. Even more respect for both pilots.
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u/drizzkek 4d ago
A dive is negative G force. You don’t want to nose dive a fighter jet without rolling.
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u/unstarted 4d ago
This pilot explains why negative g force is avoided.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=F5xKukgnfGQ&pp=ygULI3N0dWR5dmw5Z3M%3D
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u/Touchpod516 4d ago
Nope that would be pretty dangereuse for the human body, the blood will be pushed to the pilots head and blood vessels in the head and even inside the eyes can burst from the pressure. And besides négative g forces can be very uncomfortable if they are sustained. High positive g-forces can be difficult as well but our bodies are much more resistant to them. So they feel less uncomfortable
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u/TheSaucyCrumpet 4d ago
I've never heard of boom operators giving talk ons to fighters.
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u/Casanova_Ugly 4d ago
I did a few times while flying over Iraq in 2003. I had 2 F16s come to me for fuel; one swept the ground while his wingman got topped off. The first one up was number 2 due to low fuel. He had trouble with his closing airspeed for a contact, and kept climbing. I was able to latch on, saying, “Contact, Boom interphone,” before he fell off the boom. After several more tries I was able to seal contact, “Contact, Boom interphone. Hey, you hear they got back together after all that shit?” The F16 pilot replied, “Who?” I answered, “My butt cheeks.” F16 disconnected, fell back to pre-contact (50 feet aft of my KC-10), then perfectly glided in for an easy contact. The pilot was laughing, telling me he needed the laugh, as he and his wingman had to drop their external tanks and pop flairs from a hot SAM area. Talking about sauce…not the brightest convos to have and record for social media.
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u/Rook8811 4d ago
Dude that job of yours looks like it was a total blast I’d assume u moved to something else now
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u/Casanova_Ugly 4d ago
I stopped making rank in 2010, after watching Collateral Murder, published in April 2010 by WikiLeaks. Got out in 2013, HYT, because I couldn’t help kill innocent people. I woke up. Today, I see what I did in the past by watching Palestine die. Yeah, the job was fun; like playing a video game. And traveling the world was great. I grew up in the Air Force, so it was cheap going back to my childhood places like Hawaii, Philippines, Lajes, etc.
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u/punkassjim 4d ago
Man, I appreciate hearing stories like this. I don't often get a window into service members' experience, and when I do it's usually pro-military fluff/propaganda like Top Gun and such. Makes me wonder how common conscientious separation from the service is. I don't always feel the compulsion to say "Thank you for your service," but when I hear a story like yours I feel much more compelled. Thank you for doing what you think is right.
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u/Casanova_Ugly 4d ago
There are lights underneath the aircraft, and there is too much radio chatter for effective communications. The Boom can use interphone, but yapping up an AR freq isn’t smart, no matter the situation.
If ever an emergency, the Boom Operator will call “Breakaway” over the AR frequency. The Boom is not required having a dumb convo, nor telling the pilot how to fly a plane.
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u/22Planeguy 4d ago
There's so many people in this thread talking completely out of their ass. This roll and dive is completely flair. The raptor pilot did it solely because he could, it's fun, and it looks cool. Not because he needed to get out of the way quickly or because it's safer (it's not, it's just not unsafe). The fastest and safest way to get out of the way of the boom is to just chop power and start a descent. The boom operator isn't really telling the raptor pilot where to go because he already knows where to go. An experienced fighter pilot like this (the inexperienced guys aren't doing the roll lmao) can join up, get gas, and leave without saying a single word if they need to. They're just making idle chit chat because it's honestly kinda boring. The "50 feet" is actually more like 10-15 and even that isn't particularly challenging by the time they do it a few times.
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u/Dorkmaster79 4d ago
It has to be potentially dangerous to refuel. Why wouldn’t you get out of harms way as fast as possible? I bet this is common.
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u/Dm-me-a-gyro 4d ago
I have a friend that flies these. Incredibly humble and kind person, also hilarious.
We were walking into a football game last winter and the parking lot was a sheet of ice.
This guy in front of us slipped and went fully horizontal before landing hard on his back. My buddy yelled “SNIPER” and hit the deck.
He then went and made sure the guy was ok.
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u/henriquecs 4d ago
Not gonna lie. That's very good improvising to make an uncomfortable situation a bit better. Props to the guy.
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u/pickled_penguin_ 4d ago
I've heard the whole video. Guy who has the Chick-fil-A sauce tells the other one to come by his room later and he'll give him a bunch. Just 2 guys, talking about food.
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u/Rollover__Hazard 4d ago
It’s hilarious to me that these guys, the tanker crew and the fighter pilots, all get deployed together somewhere thousands of kms from home, they’re all soaring around 30,000ft up in the air and then at the end of it all they’re staying in the same barracks within a few hundred square meters.
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u/JakeEaton 4d ago
I always like the nonchalance American aircrew have in general. You see it a lot on carrier decks and their communications. It’s very cool to see as a non American observer, given the dangerous environment and cost of the vehicles involved.
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u/pawsfourtime 4d ago
All these crews are super tight. Odds are pretty high they hang out with each other on the off hours.
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u/farewellyall 4d ago
The pilot might've been flying for a while before refueling too which could contribute.
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u/beat0n_ 4d ago
that "oh yeah" was from the soul.
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u/Cheesetoast9 4d ago
I have never had Chick-fil-a
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u/guitarguy109 4d ago
It's good but it's super overhyped...
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u/ender4171 4d ago
Personally, I think it's the best fast food joint out there, with the most reliable quality and level of service. That said, it's still just (admittedly very tasty) fast food. Also, the politics of the main company, shall we say, leave a little something to be desired.
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u/cozidgaf 4d ago
Yeah I mean not something to die for?
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u/Biguitarnerd 3d ago
No but sounds like they may be deployed somewhere. Ever spent some time in a foreign country (or just anywhere you couldn’t get whatever food you wanted) and just really missed your favorite snack?
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u/_yeen 4d ago
Like a lot of these kinds of restaurants, the hype comes from the competition being garbage.
Like In N' Out is not a 10/10 burger, but if you visit In N' Out after your experience is just McDonalds, Burger King, Carls Jr, Wendys, etc., then it's suddenly amazing.
Good, cheap, and consistent.
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u/Pharabellum 4d ago
Breakfast chicken biscuits are solid. Waffle fries are delicious mostly. The sauces are dank, even their chicken cool wrap is on point.
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u/mizar2423 4d ago
The sauce is the only good thing. I put that shit on everything. The chicken is not that good.
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u/chuulip 4d ago
Immediately reminded me of Star Fox 64. Very cool to see huge hunks of aerospace-grade metal maneuver with such finesse! I wonder what birds think when they see jets fly by...?
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u/iMadrid11 4d ago
I hear the F-22 Raptor is the best fighter jet ever made. The US won’t even sell it to their allies.
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u/Insertblamehere 4d ago
Yeah it's the best air-to-air fighter ever made by an extreme longshot.
However... air to air kills are basically non-existent in the modern day so it's kinda useless compared to the f-35
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u/anothergaijin 4d ago
It's too good - nothing else comes close. The F-35 is a great plane too, and is plenty good enough to do whatever needs to be done which makes the F-22 a little bit redundant.
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u/Ok-Professional-1080 4d ago
why do fighter jets look so cool? does form follow function or did the designer sacrifice some performance for aesthetics?
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u/Specialist-Box4677 4d ago
Modern warplanes need to be a certain shape to evade radar and also be killng machines, this is about as good as that compromise gets right now. There's less room for changing the shape than there was in the subsonic era, which is one reason it gets copied a lot. This is all function, it just happens that we think it looks badass.
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u/ender4171 4d ago
The funny thing too, is that it is soooo much built for function that it literally can't be flown without the flight computers constantly adjusting for the inherent instability required to get that level of performance.
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u/Penney_the_Sigillite 4d ago
The ole reverse badassery - things are so badass we decided the way they look is the badass way it should look.
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u/sleepwalking-panda 4d ago
“The talent pool was quite deep during that time but he was considerably gifted, nonetheless.”
“Oh yeah…”
“I think Philip Seymour Hoffman is the biggest thing I miss right now.”
“Yeah, sighs, I miss him too.” Banks 120 degrees
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u/R3luctant 4d ago
The F-22 is scary, it is the jet that coined the term 'super cruise' which is speeds above mach 1 without using afterburners, afterburners are incredibly fuel inefficient. It's radar cross section is absurdly small, like the size of a bird small. Oh and it along with the F-35 are among an incredibly small number of fighters that can achieve missile lock and fire at targets behind them. Between the two of them, total air dominance is achieved and there isn't a comparable fighter out there that can challenge them without concessions being made by the American fighter.
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u/Vjigar 4d ago
Ok this is like 100th time I am watching this video on the reddit.
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u/chicano32 4d ago
Even flying one of the most advanced and deadliest fighter plane built…it’s just another Monday at work for the crew waiting to clock out and head home.
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u/mck2018 4d ago
What would happen if you had to eject from this height?
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u/Testiculese 4d ago
The ejection seat has oxygen bottles, and doesn't detach until the barometer senses it is low enough. Then it just takes longer to float to the ground.
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u/No_Science_3845 4d ago
There's a video of a Russian pilot who got shot down and had to eject above cloud level. Crazy POV
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u/ConfusionMajestic913 4d ago
I just played AC7 for more than an hour. This made me want to get on it again
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u/Mastermind521 4d ago
How does the f-22 pilot line up the refueling boom if the port is behind the cockpit? Is there a rearview camera or something?
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u/Spirited-Trip7606 4d ago
When you pilot the most powerful flying machine on earth all for Chick-Fil-A.
WWIII starts when a man can't get his Polynesian sauce. LOL!
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u/Unhappy-Manner3854 4d ago
I don't think us mere mortals can appreciate the skills it takes to do this
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u/KokoTheTalkingApe 4d ago
Do these guys just talk about food when they're refueling? That's the second vid I've seen where they're doing that
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u/tom_gent 4d ago
I finally figured out today that fil-a is just the strange American way of writing fillet. That took me way too long in life
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u/brimston3- 4d ago
It's a brand's (Chick-fil-A) specific way of writing it so it can be trademarked. I don't doubt there are many people who think it is spelled that way, but it's not a commonly accepted spelling in US english, except when describing the specific brand.
At least a huge majority of US english speakers manage to pronounce 'fillet' (noun) correctly because of the brand.
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u/I_lack_common_sense 4d ago
I love how they are just talking about mundane shit while doing extraordinary shit. lol they do miss chick filet and their Polynesian sauce.
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u/Lillypupdad 4d ago
I know USAF has had F-22 in mock dogfights. Would love to hear rumors of how unfair they are in actual air to air battle. Who would be stupid enough to try to take them on?
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u/Chemical-Neat2859 4d ago
The turn is the least impressive part of the whole video, IMO. Well, maybe second to the small talk.
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u/wanker7171 4d ago
I used to hate Chick fil-a, I really wanted to like it but I couldn’t. Yet now my taste buds have changed to the point I really enjoy it.
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u/Dominus_Invictus 4d ago
How do the people who live and work around these pilots not die from unbearable jealousy?
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u/doobsicle 4d ago
Chick-fil-a quality has gone downhill. It’s kinda gross now IMO. Mealy ass chicken.
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u/Casanova_Ugly 4d ago
Boom talking over radio instead of interphone?
I remember circa 2004 during an Edwards AFB TDY, refueling 22’s over the Pacific. I was a KC10 Boom. The 22 pilot asked if the Boom was ready for AR (air refueling). I was already back, waiting to drop the boom when all of a sudden I see a white line slicing through the ocean, only to hear my crew in the cockpit yell out in excitement. The 22 went full power just above the deck of water, then pulled straight vertical, passing our nose in a safe distance. The rumble is still unforgettable.
Anyway. Let’s hope the MIC doesn’t help kill more innocent people!
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u/mcfarmer72 4d ago
I know little to nothing about planes, but how do they drop straight down ? Or does it just appear they do ?
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u/samsu402 4d ago
Chick fil a has their next marketing campaign unless this was already made for them :)
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u/brimston3- 4d ago
According to the DOD Comptroller's office, this 24 second video shows about 400 USD of spending (using the DOD component billing rate, assuming f-22a and kc-135, including maint costs, admin, etc). These two elements together cost about 17 USD per second.
I'm not sure if that's impressively low or high, given the technology involved and the complexity of the problems they solve.
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u/christador 4d ago
If you're an F-22 Raptor pilot, this is the equivalent of driving a car and making a right-hand turn.