Lightning vs Harrier 1v1
I'm pleased to add some more fuel from afar by sort of quoting the 1(F) people from the Wittering Magazine in the late 80's. Where they announced the sad retirement of the Lightning with the 'last ever gun camera film' tag and the exciting arrival of the F2 with 'First ever gun camera film of'
Barry McGuigan didnt have wings, but if he did he'd have been a Harrier!
Barry McGuigan didnt have wings, but if he did he'd have been a Harrier!
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Surely the answer lies in the Falklands.
Please correctl me if I’m wrong but:
Of 31? deployed Harriers, 28 saw action and accounted for 31 Argentine aircraft shot down with no air-to-air losses themselves.
Including 7 Dagger’s shot down by Sea Harriers.
Given that the Lightning / Dagger are same era / technologies aeroplanes I think it answers the question.
***
Sorry LM, 7 years HFS Wittering, only 1 year on 29 Sqdn
Please correctl me if I’m wrong but:
Of 31? deployed Harriers, 28 saw action and accounted for 31 Argentine aircraft shot down with no air-to-air losses themselves.
Including 7 Dagger’s shot down by Sea Harriers.
Given that the Lightning / Dagger are same era / technologies aeroplanes I think it answers the question.
***
Sorry LM, 7 years HFS Wittering, only 1 year on 29 Sqdn
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..and the FA2 would have found its carrier several hundred feet lower than where it took off from without the F3 to help defend it.
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Once did DACT against a Lightning, a Harrier and F4 in the same sortie. Wiped the floor with all three of them both then flew back to ISK for SURPIC/VASTAC with some Buccs. He didn't fancy any 'doggers'!
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I came across this the other day ... the Artist describes it as an "English Electric Lightning F53 in BoB scheme with Vectored Thrust" ... Phwoar !
VIFF'ing that might have been fun in full reheat
VIFF'ing that might have been fun in full reheat
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
Did 25 years as a Fighter Controller, best 2 years were at Staxton Wold working with the Binbrook wing. Following comments.
1. ACT is a knife fight in a telephone box, no one does it for real if they can help it. In the real world you snuck up behind the target* and shot him in the back. Historically over 90% of pilots shot down never saw who got them.
(*Ltg era, F4 onwards you took the BVR shot and blew through and re-attacked).
2. Harrier GR1/3/5/7, Jaguar, Buccaneer, Tornado GR1/4 were bombers. If you can force a bomber to drop his bombs and turn and fight you've done your job, he's failed in his mission. If you couldn't get the easy kill you let him go. He'd have to come back again tomorrow and you'd get a second go.
3. Of the 4 types above the hardest to kill, in descending order, were the Buccaneer, Jaguar, Tornado and Harrier.
a. Buccaneer would sit on the deck and was stealthy, very hard to detect. Biggest giveaway, till they caught on, was the wake they left on the sea surface. Fighters found it hard to get an IR mx lock and sh*t themselves trying to get a gun angle. The Buccaneer would run them out of fuel then carry on to the target.
b. The Jaguar, due to it's wing, was the worst of the lot in a fight and lost energy at a high rate in a turn with little thrust to make up for it; but it could go at a hell of a rate in a straight line and was reasonably difficult to detect. They had good tactics, having pairs in trail at lower heights, claiming a lot of kills on fighters who didn't see the last trail pair (see point 1).
c. Tornado fin was like a barn door, easy to detect and like a barn door visually, but with a good turn of speed, at least if it wasn't carrying the JP223.
d. Harrier had a large frontal aspect and was easy to detect and didn't have a great turn of speed. Roll out well behind and come in with a lot of overtake, if no shot go vertical, extend and do the same thing again.
If there was an aircraft that was virtually impossible to engage it was the A-10. Great mutual support and a tight turning circle. They'd circle the wagon train and pull to get a gatling gun shot if a fighter tried to get astern a wing man. Shortest Lightning sortie I ever controlled was a F3 during an exercise who merged with the A-10s off Spurn Head straight off the runway. He spent the next 5 minutes just about permanently in reheat and was Joker RTB in 9 minutes.
Reference the Falklands. The only radar equipped, Mirage 3, fighters were kept on the mainland to protect Buenos Aires. The Mirage 5 and Daggers were non-radar equipped and bombers. They were also operating 250+ miles from home with only 5-10 minutes over the Islands and had to stay low to keep out of the fleet radar and Sea Dart cover, thus also not getting any help from the TPS-43 radar at Stanley. The Shar was a cat amongst the pigeons.
The Lightning was fun to control but, in terms of AD effectiveness, was an anachronism. Only 2 rear aspect** IR Mx and, realistically, one kill; lousy endurance and a short range pulse radar. Compare that to the F-4 with 4 semi-active radar and 4 all aspect IR mx and a PD radar. (**I know the Redtop had a theoretical frontal capability
).
And I got to fly in the T5 but not in the F-4 or F-3.
1. ACT is a knife fight in a telephone box, no one does it for real if they can help it. In the real world you snuck up behind the target* and shot him in the back. Historically over 90% of pilots shot down never saw who got them.
(*Ltg era, F4 onwards you took the BVR shot and blew through and re-attacked).
2. Harrier GR1/3/5/7, Jaguar, Buccaneer, Tornado GR1/4 were bombers. If you can force a bomber to drop his bombs and turn and fight you've done your job, he's failed in his mission. If you couldn't get the easy kill you let him go. He'd have to come back again tomorrow and you'd get a second go.
3. Of the 4 types above the hardest to kill, in descending order, were the Buccaneer, Jaguar, Tornado and Harrier.
a. Buccaneer would sit on the deck and was stealthy, very hard to detect. Biggest giveaway, till they caught on, was the wake they left on the sea surface. Fighters found it hard to get an IR mx lock and sh*t themselves trying to get a gun angle. The Buccaneer would run them out of fuel then carry on to the target.
b. The Jaguar, due to it's wing, was the worst of the lot in a fight and lost energy at a high rate in a turn with little thrust to make up for it; but it could go at a hell of a rate in a straight line and was reasonably difficult to detect. They had good tactics, having pairs in trail at lower heights, claiming a lot of kills on fighters who didn't see the last trail pair (see point 1).
c. Tornado fin was like a barn door, easy to detect and like a barn door visually, but with a good turn of speed, at least if it wasn't carrying the JP223.
d. Harrier had a large frontal aspect and was easy to detect and didn't have a great turn of speed. Roll out well behind and come in with a lot of overtake, if no shot go vertical, extend and do the same thing again.
If there was an aircraft that was virtually impossible to engage it was the A-10. Great mutual support and a tight turning circle. They'd circle the wagon train and pull to get a gatling gun shot if a fighter tried to get astern a wing man. Shortest Lightning sortie I ever controlled was a F3 during an exercise who merged with the A-10s off Spurn Head straight off the runway. He spent the next 5 minutes just about permanently in reheat and was Joker RTB in 9 minutes.
Reference the Falklands. The only radar equipped, Mirage 3, fighters were kept on the mainland to protect Buenos Aires. The Mirage 5 and Daggers were non-radar equipped and bombers. They were also operating 250+ miles from home with only 5-10 minutes over the Islands and had to stay low to keep out of the fleet radar and Sea Dart cover, thus also not getting any help from the TPS-43 radar at Stanley. The Shar was a cat amongst the pigeons.
The Lightning was fun to control but, in terms of AD effectiveness, was an anachronism. Only 2 rear aspect** IR Mx and, realistically, one kill; lousy endurance and a short range pulse radar. Compare that to the F-4 with 4 semi-active radar and 4 all aspect IR mx and a PD radar. (**I know the Redtop had a theoretical frontal capability
). And I got to fly in the T5 but not in the F-4 or F-3.
Last edited by ORAC; 18th Dec 2012 at 09:08.
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
I would put the Vulcan pretty high on the list.
I remember the briefs from the pilots when planning a 1v1 single frequency sortie and trying to get an edge so the Vulcan wouldn't get visual and know when to start turning.
"if he's displaced left, call him displaced right and vice-versa. If he's displaced left, half the range, if displaced right, double the range".
More often than not the forgot what they'd asked for when they got airborne.....
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2 Lightnings
- crikey - a luxury!! You'll be telling me they had a tanker too, next........................
Last edited by BOAC; 18th Dec 2012 at 09:28.
I would put the Vulcan high on the list too BOAC.
But only at medium to high level where it could turn like hell! Get him at low level and it was a different story! Very poor lookout and nowhere to go!
But only at medium to high level where it could turn like hell! Get him at low level and it was a different story! Very poor lookout and nowhere to go!
