Left: The F-5’s
missions
typically last
50-55 minutes
due to limited
fuel capacity.
Below:
Carrying a
single AIM-9M
training round,
an F-5N taxies
swiftly from the
sun shelters.goggles, but we still y in the low-
altitude blocks at night, we know the
terrain tops and we stay 1,000ft above
those hard deck altitudes.’
‘Usually their objective is to not get
caught up with us,’ says Gottschalk as
talk turns to close-in ghting. ‘The
desired learning objectives of the ight
can often be met just by getting the
geometry right, but there are some
scenarios where we get to the merge
— sometimes we actively plan to end
up dog ghting. Usually, merging with
us tends to be frowned upon. Getting
into that close-in ght costs precvious
fuel, and the eet crews likely have
other things they need to achieve
rather than dog ghting with us. It’s
more about the presentation they get
from us that they need to manage.
‘We have dedicated ights where we
dog ght, but squadrons tend to do that
kind of stu in house. Others do come
here to y DACT [dissimilar air combat
training] with us, particularly the
training squadrons. We sometimes
support TOPGUN and that’s usually
1-v-1 BFM.’
‘We are about providing the numbers
of ‘Red Air’ targets,’ adds LT Holeski. ‘We
have a lot of aircraft plus we’re reliable.
In SFARP, for example, the Weapons
School evaluators can terminate on a
ght before we get into BFM.’US NAVY & MARINE CORPS AIR POWER YEARBOOK 2018
(^64) UNIT REPORT
58-65 VFC-13 C.indd 64 01/06/2018 11:49