Weird California sighting

a reply to: Perfect stranger

That's a U-2S. There was also 68-10336, a TU-2S, that was up about the same time out of Palmdale. He's flying again today doing basically the same thing.

a reply to: Zaphod58
Do you think this catching have something to see with The Weird California ?

"" There was an interesting catch on ADS-B the other night. The target showed 51,000+ feet and was last seen heading out over the Pacific at Mach 2.5. ""

Theres been something cruising up and down the NE English coast the last few nights, nothing has been on flight radar or freedar and I unfortunately dont have access to anything more informative. I've heard it about 3 times this week around 4am, didnt sound like eurofighters so its had me wondering. Any thoughts.

a reply to: Zaphod58

here is another cool one.. FLa to Japan? what is that; 630 kts 33000

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a reply to: Perfect stranger
may have been a carrier landing. that would have been one hell of a ride Florida to Sagami Bay!

a reply to: Perfect stranger

never saw any glitch like this, he's back over Montana?

originally posted by: Catch_a_Fire
Theres been something cruising up and down the NE English coast the last few nights, nothing has been on flight radar or freedar and I unfortunately dont have access to anything more informative. I've heard it about 3 times this week around 4am, didnt sound like eurofighters so its had me wondering. Any thoughts.

Could it be the F-35?

Could it be the F-35?

Retention must be great in that squadron. “Hey guys, we are going to fly at 0400 hours. Training is great at that time.” No good reason for it I can think of. But you are throwing ideas out there. Dudes in a squadron would push back on that stupid idea pretty quick.

a reply to: glib2

Uh, no they wouldn't. If they're military, they don't get the choice to push back if they want to keep flying. The F-35 and other stealth aircraft are designed to operate at night a lot. There's a lot of night training involved with them. Just because you can't think of a good reason for night training doesn't mean there aren't a few dozen of them. We have F-35s taking off and landing at Luke early in the morning, just after sunrise all the time.

ETA: There's a very good reason for the saying "Train the way you fight". You don't train during the day, and just start fighting at night when there's a war on.

a reply to: Perfect stranger

It's a P-8A Poseidon. They frequently show up as generic aircraft shapes. It's back over Washington today.

originally posted by: Forensick

originally posted by: Catch_a_Fire
Theres been something cruising up and down the NE English coast the last few nights, nothing has been on flight radar or freedar and I unfortunately dont have access to anything more informative. I've heard it about 3 times this week around 4am, didnt sound like eurofighters so its had me wondering. Any thoughts.

Could it be the F-35?

It's possible, I certainly wouldn't rule it out. I've heard it since but not as regular.

There was a description, in one of these aircraft threads recently of someone watching a craft doing what seemed to him like speed trials ie, accelerating then slowing, accelerating through some turns etc...... this description fell right in to what Ive heard here, if that makes sense. What he described he saw was like what I was hearing, but in completely different sides of the pond and at different times.

a reply to: Catch_a_Fire

There are interesting programs in the UK, as well as some maintenance facilities. It could be an F-35 doing post maintenance testing. When they do an FCF they have to test everything, from shutting down the engine and restarting it, to going supersonic, depending on the aircraft and the parameters being checked.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: Catch_a_Fire

There are interesting programs in the UK, as well as some maintenance facilities. It could be an F-35 doing post maintenance testing. When they do an FCF they have to test everything, from shutting down the engine and restarting it, to going supersonic, depending on the aircraft and the parameters being checked.

Certainly sounds something like that zaph, even went and smoked on the back step, hoping to see it but it's too far off the coast I think.

a reply to: Catch_a_Fire

From what I have heard, two of the first F-35s that were delivered to the UK became cann birds. That would mean they hadn't flown in awhile, so would require at least one test flight after they had everything replaced, if not multiple. If they got them back together, you might have been hearing them testing.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Weak. Luke guys taking off after sunrise does not equal four AM sorties. You know, for a special stealth jet designed to fly at night. Jeesh. I guess all the other non-stealth jets weren’t designed to fly at night so no four am sorties for them. A fighter squadron of bros would definitely tell the boss a two AM brief for a four AM sortie is ridiculous when it can be briefed at six pm. The instructors at a minimum would squash it unless there was a really good reason.

a reply to: glib2

Those flights landing after sunrise didn't just take off right before the sun came up. And there are plenty of late night sorties going on with all kinds of different platforms, including 4th gen stuff. WSINT right now is flying overnight out of Nellis with just about everything we currently use. Red Flag flies late just about every day they fly. Every few months there are night missions of all different platforms. Usually they stop flying earlier in the night, depending on the base and the area around them, but more remote locations have been known to fly late at night during their night exercises. But hey, let's just train during the day and early at night, and that'll be good enough for when we have to actually fight overnight.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Familiar with WSINT. Standard long days happening now. RedFlag doesn’t fly at four AM. The night go’s try to get out and in your room before the sunrise to stay on schedule.

Night is night. The nttr is no different at 2100 vs 0400 for mass training. I’m familiar with the remote airspace’s and what flies in them late at night. It’s typically not F-35s. The fights at nellis at night that take a couple hours don’t have much value the later you go, it just increases risk with safety. The exotics are a different story, but an F-35 isn’t an exotic. It’s about to be legacy itself.

Just wanted to give a bump to my favorite ATS thread. It's been a long time since anything's been posted here.

Any new sightings/rumors/anecdotes about the Green lady?

a reply to: SeymourFrishberg

Nothing out here in Vegas aside from a nice 2-5k fly over by a thunderbird a few days ago. Really rattled the air as he came by!