Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk: The Futuristic Ghost Plane

hello everybody welcome back to a brand new episode of mega projects this one is all about the lockheed f-117 night talk you might not have heard of this plane but you definitely know what it looks like it looks insanely cool largely i decided to make this video because it looks so insanely cool but you know the story behind it is pretty great as well so let's jump in [Music] it has become one of the most recognizable shapes in the aviation world a black futuristic ghost tearing through the sky often undetected even today 39 years after it first took to the sky and it sure doesn't look 39 years old it still feels like an aircraft that has somehow slipped through a portal into our world a plane that is still steeped in mystery and indeed the first to use stealth technology its name is the lockheed f-117 nighthawk but most of the world knows it today as the stealth fighter this is an aircraft that stands alone yes others now carry similar technology but nothing can match the alluring power of the nighthawk a sleek revolutionary design that looks something like it came out of robocop because of its covert production it is a story that is steeped in intrigue and one that fascinated the world until its official unveiling [Music] this may be one of the most extraordinary aircraft that the united states has ever produced but the story of the nighthawk actually begins with a soviet mathematician by the name of piotr ulfimzev his groundbreaking paper released in 1964 method of edge waves in the physical theory of diffraction would change the way we think about aircraft design he showed that an aircraft's radar return did not depend simply on its size as had been previously thought but rather on its edge configuration he found that even large aircraft could significantly lower their radar visibility by altering their structure however the paper which was submitted to the moscow institute for radio engineering went no further than the theoretical stage fintev was completely right but such changes in the 1960s would have seriously affected an aircraft's aerodynamic ability i mean who cares if your plane can't be seen by radar if it can't fly a fincep's paper was just a bit ahead of its time but it didn't have to wait long in the early 1970s lockheed analyst denny's overhaulser came across the paper and by this point computer technology had progressed to the level that something like what himself had envisioned a decade before might just now be possible one of the most enticing aspects of the nighthawk was the mystery that it emerged from a black project is a secretive military or defense project typically unacknowledged by the us government the development of the nighthawk fell into this category one of the blackest of black projects even inside the walls of the pentagon few people knew about its production development of the plane began in 1975 using a model aircraft that was referred to as the hopeless diamond taken from the hope diamonds one of the world's most expensive jewels in 1976 the defense advanced research projects agency darpa issued lockheed skunk works a contract to construct two sub-scale working models lockheed skunk works in burbank california an official pseudonym for lockheed martin's advanced development programs adp has been responsible for a dazzling array of aircraft over the years many of which we've already featured here on mega projects including the u2 the lockheed sl-71 blackbird lockheed martin f-22 raptor the lockheed martin f-35 lightning ii and of course today's plane the lockheed f-117 night talk it's doubtful there is a better aviation development department anywhere on the planet the code name have blue was used what would go on to become the f-117 and by the end of 1977 two aircraft had been completed under budget for 35 million dollars which is 149 million dollars today quite a remarkable thing under budget on a megaprojects video these models included the jet engines of the northrop t-38a the fly-by-wire systems of the f-16 the landing gear of the a-10 and the environmental systems of the c-130 they were two ragtag aircraft that were kind of bodged together but hb1001 and hb1002 proved that this new technology totally worked okay so i know i said that they both worked but they also both totally crashed during development nevertheless the defense department liked what they saw before the crashes and the program was expanded under the code name senior trend senior trends sounds like a a cheap shop for old people to buy clothes at skunk works computer program named echo was used to design an aircraft with flat panels called facets these were then arranged in such a way as to scatter over 99 of a radar signal energy it came to be known as painting the aircraft the first f-117 that we would recognize today was flown at area 51 on the 18th of june 1981 and was developed and trialled over the coming years rumors in the media began to circulate about a mysterious stealth fighter known as the f-19 completely inaccurate models were created and paraded on television even computer games got in on the act the public was hooked but they totally didn't know what they were hooked on in july 1986 an f-117 crashed in the sequoia national park killing the pilot and starting a forest fire as firefighters began converging on the area the full power of the u.s government swung into action a helicopter gunship circled the area as armed guards on the ground prevented anybody including firefighters getting anywhere near the crash site the wreckage of the f-117 was later replaced with an f-101 voodoo that had been kept at area 51 but the fact that i've just told you about this shows that they obviously didn't do a fantastic job covering it up the government only acknowledged its existence on the 10th of november 1988 with a single grainy image but it wasn't until april 1990 that two f-117s arrived at nellis air force base and were officially presented to a crowd of tens of thousands the ghosts had finally emerged a total of 64 f-117s had been built with five full-scale development fsd aircraft designated with the same yf-117a designation the final f-117 number 59 was delivered on the 3rd of july 1990. their fly away cost meaning simply production cost was 42.6 million or about 91 million today [Music] let's begin with what the f-117 is not many wrongly assume that the stealth fighters are completely invisible to radar which is totally wrong their design dramatically reduces their chances of detection but invisible definitely not as we'll get into in just a bit they are also not great to fly and have even been given the very descriptive nickname the wobblin goblin though pilots have said this is perhaps a touch on the unfair side they can only carry two bombs and they're not particularly fast compared to other aircraft and they'll also be fairly hopeless against a top-grade aircraft in a dogfight to be honest they are experts at covert operations at night and that's about it but enough of what they're not let's get into what they definitely are the f-117 has a radar cross-section of about 0.001 square meters and wings with a high sweep angle of 50 degrees meaning the wings are at a much tighter angle than almost any other aircraft which deflects incoming radar waves to the sides the aircraft was painted using radar absorbing iron ball paint and was magnetically charged to reduce radar returns the exhaust ports on the f-117 were also narrowed considerably compared to other aircraft into tight slits which minimized detection by infrared systems it comes with two non-after burning general electric f404 turbofan engines each with a thrust of 10 600 pound force giving it a maximum speed of 684 miles per hour as a comparison the f-22 which replaced it for many of its combat roles has a top speed of 1 500 miles per hour with each of its engines giving out 26 000 pound force of thrust essentially it is twice as fast and its engines have over twice the thrust the plane measures 25 meters in length and has a wingspan of 13.2 meters its range is 1720 kilometers but it can be refueled in mid-air and this brings us on to a nice fact and that's that shortly after the gulf war pilots flew non-stop with refueling from holloman in new mexico to kuwait taking roughly 18.5 hours to this day this remains a record for a single-seat fighter one particularly intriguing aspect of the f-117 is that it essentially is automated it has sophisticated navigation and attack systems integrated into a digital avionics suite before a mission data is uploaded to an automated planning system which can control every aspect of the flight including weapons release though from what we gather pilots typically disengage this system shortly before attack and take control this automation is done because as i said a little earlier this is not the easiest plane to fly its design means that slight flight alterations are constantly needed to keep it in the air aerodynamically it's a bit of a bucking bronco asking a pilot to do this on a long flight would be pretty preposterous so well a computer was the alternative they don't get tired [Music] the first combat operations for the f-117 came in 1989. operation just cause began on the 20th of december as the united states invaded panama the operation to depose manuel noriega who the cia had been working with for years but had now fallen out of favor with was a swift one done and dusted in just six weeks the invasion is something that we could ramble on about for a long time but for the sake of not rambling on and remaining on topic we'll just not get into it maybe another day on a different channel operation just cause saw two bombs dropped by two f-117s on riojito airfield and just like that the combat life of the stealth fighter had begun two years after a significantly larger and more dangerous operation lay ahead as the sun set over baghdad on the evening of the 16th of january 1991 most knew that something was coming the build-up to the first gulf war had been long and protracted but a deadline set by the u.n for iraq to withdraw its troops from kuwait passed on the 15th of january as nightfall final preparations were made to the first wave of 10 f-117s waiting on the tarmac in total three waves totaling 30 aircraft would take off that night and attack strategic targets mainly in and around baghdad military planners had established that combat losses would be around five percent it was expected that not all of these revolutionary bombers were coming back that night the gulf war began with a terrifying display of firepower that would continue for 42 consecutive days and that five percent prediction proved to be incorrect every single one of the f-117s made it back safely throughout the war the f-117s completed 1 300 missions over 6905 flight hours and they were even used as propaganda as they were pictured on leaflets dropped by coalition forces urging iraqi citizens to escape now and save yourselves things went a little quiet for the f-117s after the gulf war but in 1999 they entered the fray once again the kosovo war began in february 1998 with fighting between the forces of the federal republic of yugoslavia and the kosovo albanian rebel group the kosovo liberation army kla the causes and reasons are truly complex here and we're not going to dive in this is a channel about mega projects not the history of every war ever but it was principally over the sovereign rights of kosovo and its people with the war dragging painfully on with no end in sight they so intervened and bombing raids across yugoslavia took place between the 24th of march and the 10th of june 1999. on the 27th of march 1 f-117 taking part in the operation never returned after it was shot down by the yugoslavian army the f-117 was picked up by radar at a distance of 13 kilometers and an altitude of eight kilometers the yugoslavian anti-aircraft missile system launched a series of sa-3s the yugoslav version of the soviet isaiah s-25 neva after one sa-3 hit the f-117 the aircraft quickly became unflyable and the pilot ejected shortly after the pilot was recovered six hours later but the wreckage was not with some later claiming that the technology had been sold to either the chinese or the russians or maybe to both it remains the only f-117 to ever be shot down f-117s were later used in both operation enduring freedom in 2001 in afghanistan and operation iraqi freedom in 2003 in iraq but their role in the u.s air force was coming to an end the fleets of f-117s were initially slated for retirement in 2011 but that was brought forward to 2008. the ferocious f-22 raptor was now on the scene and began taking on much of the responsibility that the f-117s had bringing the retirement date forward meant freeing up an additional 1.07 billion dollars to buy more f-22s while the imminent arrival of the f-35 lightning meant that stealth fighters were about to be pushed even further from combat operations between the 13th of march 2007 and the 22nd of april 2008 the fleet of f-117s were retired in seven waves except for four which were kept in operation to be used for test flights while a few of the aircraft found their way into museums the majority were mothballed to be kept combat ready a national defense authorization act in 2017 stated that four f-117s each year would be scrapped a process known as demilitarizing an aircraft but well this isn't quite the end of our story [Music] despite this sightings of f-117s have still occurred in recent years in southern california and death valley civilians have seen and photographed f-117s still in action one photo even shows the words dark knights and unit markings not associated with any known squadrons leading some to suggest that the aircraft may still be in operation perhaps in an unofficial capacity these whenever aircraft that were going to slip away quietly and their legendary status has remained unrestrained during the 1980s tales of these mysterious ghosts captivated the world they symbolized an extraordinary step forward in aviation an aircraft that was rarely detected their black paint and jagged appearance provided a terrifying almost apocalyptic vision a hellish nightmare appearing suddenly overhead though they are certainly not quite the invincible knights they once were heralded as they remain one of the most iconic aircraft the world has ever known ghosts have always provided humans with a chilling fear a ghost that can slip silently across borders high in the night sky well that's a whole different kind of fear so i really hope you found that video interesting a bit of a background to certainly one of the most famous planes just by looking at it you know everyone knows what that nightwalk looks like if you did enjoy this video please do hit that thumbs up button below don't forget to subscribe thank you for [Music] [Music] watching

Channel: Megaprojects

Views: 588,366

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Id: bG_4z8x46B0

Length: 15min 26sec (926 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 09 2020