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Originally Posted by Deschodt
And another starfighter kills its pilot, this time on wheels..
necessary PPOT disclaimer: I think it's a converted starfighter - looks the part , and I know that jet wasn't that bad in reality and got a bad rep.
RIP, I liked her from back when Mythbusters was smart and funny...
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 74-911
Definitely looks like an F-104 all right.... IIRC the Germans had a lot of them back in the 60's and 70's ??
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Yep - you're both right, it's a converted F104. It's actually a local Pacific Northwest effort, out of the Tacoma, WA area, so we've seen a lot of news coverage over the years.
A friend of mine and fellow Pelican, who happened to work for the same little airplane company I worked for, helped out on this effort. He is an aerodynamicist, and worked with them in their early days in that regard.
And, yes, the Germans had a bunch of them in the '60's and '70's. I grew up spending summers in the little town of Warburg with my Oma and Opa. There was a cool castle ruins up on a hill just outside of town that my cousins and I would wander out to all the time. It was a prominent enough landmark that the local fighter squadron would use it as a turn-around point. We would be up on top of the tower, jumping up and down and waving our arms. We like to think one or two pilots actually waved back. These were all F104's and F4's. Good times for us kids.