F-22, what DO you do?

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Check out this dizzying air show footage of a Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor doing maneuvers that have got to be putting the pilot’s balls in a box.

This video, from the same air show, is even longer. Wow.

My dad was a radio technician in the Air Force, and he was lucky enough to share a hangar with an SR-71 Blackbird. (It’s still the scariest looking, most beautiful airplane ever built.) Listening to his stories is what started my lifelong fascination with Lockheed birds, and my parents and I used to go to the Air Force museum in Dayton almost every summer. (In fact, we went again just a couple of years ago. They had one of the YF-22 prototypes of the F-22 there, and it was the unanimous family favorite. Dad and I also flew the simulator. We couldn’t shoot anything down, so we just started rolling it over and over again until our time was up. We could barely walk when we got out.)

The F-22 is everything rolled into one: speed, agility and advanced stealth technology. It does things that civilians like me will never know about, and that drives me friggin’ crazy.

That’s my idea of Heaven. I’m on the beach, with a big giant book that’s got the answers to everything. Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, what the F-22 can do. Why the things I like to eat make my cholesterol go up, while the things that taste like cardboard make it go down. Stuff like that.

P.S. I was going to show this to my friend James, but I already know what he’d say. “Not enough Lima Lima Lima!”

  • http://unitedcats.wordpress.com/ unitedcats

    LOL I think the me 262 was the coolest looking plane ever built, but I understand where you are coming from. Nice footage!

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  • http://www.johnbierly.com John

    Thanks for the comment! The 262 was a mean machine for sure, and some of stuff the Germans had on the drawing board at that time was terrifying.

    But for my money, nothing can beat the looks of the Blackbird. It looks more like something that Batman or Darth Vader would fly, and the fact that it was designed in the early 1960s makes it even more impressive to me.

    Thanks again for the comment.

  • Katy

    “That’s my idea of Heaven. I’m on the beach, with a big giant book that’s got the answers to everything. Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, what the F-22 can do. Why the things I like to eat make my cholesterol go up, while the things that taste like cardboard make it go down. Stuff like that.”

    EXACTLY!

    And!

    My dad is retired Air Force too. He was a pilot, but not of a super cool airplane, just a C-141 cargo plane. He joined the Air Force when he knew his draft number was about to come up and ending up giving his life to it. He’s got a patriot’s heart, but he’s no warrior. So he figured it was better to fly over Vietnam than march through it in the Army. When he finished Officer training and flight school, he said all the guys were rushing for the fighter planes. He says they’re fun to watch and fly in the simulator, but he was glad to let the others have ‘em. :) He now teaches young guys (and gals) how to fly C-17s for the military, so I’ve had the chance to fly a simulator a few times too. Again, a cargo plane’s not as fun as an F-22, but it’s still a neat experience. I’ve never been to Dayton, but I have sat on the open end of a C-5 and watched the sunrise. Maybe that counts for something.

    And!

    My father-in-law is an electrical engineer who helped write part of the computer programming for the original stealth bomber. He’s done other stuff that he can’t tell us about because it’s top secret. No joke.

  • http://www.johnbierly.com John

    Watching the sunrise from the open end of a C-5 — another Lockheed bird, and so is the C-141! — is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever heard. I’ve walked through the belly of many a C-5 on the ground at past Dayton air shows, and it never failed to inspire awe.

    It’s too cool that your dad teaches C-17 pilots. That’s such an awesome plane, truly one of the coolest looking transports ever built. That rocks!

    And!

    Speaking of the stealth bomber, one of them flew over my friend Bob’s cookout right here in southern Indiana a couple of weekends ago. (It was in town for the Thunder Over Louisville air show.)

    And your father-in-law knows some secrets, eh? Let’s get him drunk!