Goodbye to the F-111 Aardvark

Back in May I blogged about the upcoming final retirement of the last in service General Dynamics F-111 of the RAAF. Well that time has come for the beast some 46 years after the first prototype first flew. I won't rehash everything I wrote back then, but that day is now almost here. On Dec 2, 2010 the F-111 will be retired and for fan's of this massive strike plane its a sad day. These beasts were operated by the US Air Force in a few variants, including long-range strike, and with the EF-111 Raven variant, electronic warfare. In USAF service F-111s participated in the Vietnam War, the US attack on Libya in 1986, and Operation Desert Storm in 1991 against Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. They were retired in 1997 by the USAF and lived another 13 years in the sky in Australia until now. The last former USAF F-111G was retired in 2007 by the RAAF.

As noted in the previous blog these will be replaced by FA-18F's built by Boeing and fitted for various roles until the real replacement for the F-111 arrives in the form of the F-35 JSF. The FA-18's are holding the door open and will do an excellent job in their multi role capacity. In fact the FA-18's have less range and are slower than the F-111 although they are much more efficient to operate and have modern communications equipment which transmits data seamlessly between airborne platforms. Perhaps more than any other deficiency, it is this shortcoming which has pushed the RAAF to retire the type even before its original replacement is ready to be fielded.

But to any airplane or airshow fan the most missed aspect of the F-111 is the dump and burn......

How Cool is That Map?

One of the coolest things about having a blog is knowing that people from virtually anywhere in the world can read what you write. Over the years I've read hundreds, perhaps thousands of blog's and blog posts from around the world. Many by just clicking the random "next" at the top o the Blogger page. People post for a myriad of reasons. It doesn't really matter how or why. For some it's for therapeutic reasons. For others its for work. It just matters that we do. In college I wrote quite a bit. I started college fearing the term paper and almost any composition. By the end I wanted it all to be written. I was not an English major, but I learned a ton from taking classes that were in essence foreign to me. I took an East Asian Language and Literature class and a Art History class that to this day I can remember everything we did. All my other classes are gone in a blur. Those two classes were different. They challenged me to open up my horizons and to look beyond what was around me and comfortable. I probably did not fully appreciate it at the time, but I certainly do now. In any case I picked up writing an fortunately for me I have a sister who is a writer and with almost every paper I wrote I used this new at the time thing called the internet to email her the papers where she wold comment and correct obvious errors and help me develop a writing style. This style of writing led to one of my professors sending my work to a local newspaper where she attempted to get me a job as a writer covering music and the arts. Two things I knew little about at the time beyond what I was picking up in that Art History class. Fortunately for me I did not pursue that job as I get bored dong the same things all the time. I need variety in my life. It why my interests are varied and over the history of this blog I think you can get a good snapshot of that. One thing is for certain however. I like to go fast.
If you stop by this page leave me a note. I know you're coming. I see it on the map. Go ahead and click on it. I'd really like to see visitors from Russia and Alaska. Greenland and Iceland. Madagascar and Nicaragua. Anywhere and everywhere. Its what makes a blog page so great. Thanks!