Directing another plane with your jetwash

[JammedStab]

Anybody ever heard of this?

"In that case, Lieutenant Junior Grade C.W. Vandenberg had flown out to intercept the Cougar, positioning the tip of his left wing beneath the right wing of the pilotless Cougar. By performing this risky maneuver on both sides of the Cougar, he directed airflow against the Cougar’s wings to “steer” it back over the ocean, where it ultimately crashed."

The entire story is at this link from Air & Space magazine...

I Was Almost Killed By a Navy Jet on a San Diego Beach | Military Aviation | Air & Space Magazine (http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/17_fm2017-above-beyond-180961670/)

[langleybaston]

I believe this also done to V1 doodlebugs by Tempests and Spitfires in 1944/45.

[Martin the Martian]

Toppling V1s became the preferred way of destroying them, as shooting at them from behind and then flying through the explosion as the warhead detonated often created a few brown trouser moments. Some pilots used to physically topple them with their wingtip, occasionally resulting with a dent in the end of the wing, but usually the airflow created by the fighter's wingtip was enough to upset the V1's gyro and send it out of control.

Interesting with the Cougar however, but what piques my interest even more is trying to upset the Cutlass with jet wash from other aircraft.

[Wokkafans]

I believe one of our esteemed posters took out a Puma in the Falklands with the jetwash from his Harrier.

[Basil]

Re the OP. That isn't using 'jetwash'. It's pushing one wingtip against another to flip the other aircraft.
Perhaps Mad(Flt)scientist could comment but, if you had a significant wing overlap, the reduced pressure between both would tend to make them attract each other.
A bit like 'squat' in ships travelling at speed in shallow water.

Wokkafans - Excellent and no cost other than fuel!

[SpazSinbad]

Not quite the same but gutsy neverthess:
"Their 1967 rescue from Laos was not much different from any other, but the "push" that saved their lives made aviation history...."

http://i98.photobucket.com/albums/l261/SpazSinbad/NewNewAllBum/PardosPushPhantomHookURL.gif~original (http://s98.photobucket.com/user/SpazSinbad/media/NewNewAllBum/PardosPushPhantomHookURL.gif.html)

http://tailspinstales.********.com.au/2007/06/pardos-push.html

[sandiego89]

I believe one of our esteemed posters took out a Puma in the Falklands with the jetwash from his Harrier.


I believe Mowgli puts that more down to wing tip vortices (passing VERY closely over a Puma) rather than "jet wash" from the engine.

[ORAC]

"Their 1967 rescue from Laos was not much different from any other, but the "push" that saved their lives made aviation history...." SpazSinbad,

Better link here.... Pardo’s Push: An Incredible Feat of Airmanship (http://www.historynet.com/pardos-push-an-incredible-feat-of-airmanship.htm)

[SpazSinbad]

The first link is more first person story by the particpants:
"...Controlled by hydraulics, the tailhook lowered and locked into place, swaying in the slipstream of the F-4's twin J-75 engines.

Pardo pulled in behind and below Aman's crippled F-4 and slowly came forward, hoping to lodge the elusive tailhook against the leading edge of his windshield. Flying at 250 knots (about 300 miles an hour) the tailhook kissed the front of the windshield.

"Kissed is the right word," Houghton said. "If he so much as bumped the windshield, he would have had that tailhook in his face. We're talking about glass here. It was phenomenal flying, nothing less."

Pardo, however, believed the windshield glass was strong enough to withstand mild contact. "It was more than an inch thick," he said. "I had to be careful not to let the hook hit the side panels. They were too weak to take it."...
"..."I looked up and there was the tailhook," Pardo said. "I thought, 'What do we have to lose?' He put the tailhook down and we eased in very gently and put it on our windshield and started adding power. His rate of descent decreased from about 3,000 feet per minute to about 1,500 feet per minute."

Pardo said given the condition the other F-4 was in, it would only have been able to travel on its own for approximately 30 miles. With the help from Pardo's plane, which had sustained its own share of damage, it covered nearly twice that distance.

"It got a little discouraging after about 10 minutes because our left engine caught fire and we had to shut it down," Pardo said. "We continued to push and it got us where we needed to go."..." quote from another story from 2014: http://www.af.mil/News/ArticleDisplay/tabid/223/Article/518653/legend-behind-pardo-push-visits-seymour-johnson-airmen.aspx

[charliegolf]

It got a little discouraging after about 10 minutes because our left engine caught fire

I do so love a spot of monumental understatement!

CG

[sycamore]

I`m sure I recall reading that a similar feat had been done by a couple of F-86s in Korea,pushing the top of the intake into the end of the jetpipe....

[SpazSinbad]

YANKS :} Wot will they think of next? :rolleyes: Sabre Dancing?

https://www.warhistoryonline.com/military-vehicle-news/unbelievable-us-pillot-james-risner-using-the-nose-of-his-own-jet-successfully-pushed-his-wingmans-incapacitated-jet-fighter-into-friendly-territory.html

[ORAC]

There's pushing - and there's pulling.....

deadspin-quote-carrot-aligned-w-bgr-2 (http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/the-time-a-tanker-saved-a-fighter-that-was-falling-apar-1733187406)

[Flash2001]

I think that there was an episode in Korea in which a pair of F9Fs supported another for some distance on the airflow over their wingtips.

Flash