The mission was anything but clandestine, with the F-117s in tow behind the tanker cruising directly over central Los Angeles and Long Beach in clear skies before heading out to sea. This is an unprecedented action by the usually very shy and officially retired Nighthawks. On Monday, they took a similar route, but it was above the cloud layer. The down-range activity also occurred a bit further south of where it happened on Monday, in an area commonly used by American carrier strike groups spinning up for deployment. It also looks as if the F-117s spent a bit more time playing with the assets in that area this time around.
Weird - I thought the F-117 had been retired?
ReplyDeleteI have a friend who was a F-117 crew chief and around 10 years ago he told me they were all decommissioned. Weird.
ReplyDeleteThey were indeed decommissioned, but someone in the vast military industrial complex has a use for them, so several are kept in flying condition by a small cadre of people deep in the Nevada desert.
DeleteThey use them for training now. I read in one of the military blogs I follow that they have worked with all sorts of squadrons to give them experience dealing with stealth aircraft. Not enough F-22's or F-35's so use what you got...an outstanding aircraft.
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