insisted on a set of strict demonstration
milestones. The rst YF-15A was rolled
out at St Louis in June 1972 and was
airlifted to Edwards AFB, California,
to complete its maiden ight on July
27, 1972 — its development path and
timeline can scarcely be believed today.
Indeed, the F-15A entered service with the
58th Tactical Training Wing at Luke AFB,
Arizona, in November 1974.
Unlike the unquestionably potent F-22
Raptor, which has operated in an era of
permissive aerial environments, the F-15
was at the forefront of air superiority
campaigns in a number of con icts, which
enabled it to build its headline o cial kill
ratio of 105 to nil. Eagles rst went into
action in the hands of Israeli pilots, scoring
kills against Syrian MiGs in 1979 and
throughout the 1980s. When USAF F-15
pilots were unleashed against the hapless
Iraqi Air Force during 1991’s Operation
‘Desert Storm’ it proved the Eagle’s
prowess once and for all. In the space of
two months, F-15C pilots were credited
with 36 kills without loss.
Those very same F-15Cs are still in
service today, and despite various calls
to retire the eet they look set to remain
so. Indeed, the USAF is well into a round
of signi cant upgrades to the radar, theBelow:
Photographed
with stations 1 and
9 in use, F-15SA
12-1001 is seen
on fi nal approach
to Palmdale on
October 4, 2016,
equipped with
its fl ight test
instrumentation
boom. The aircraft
carries a GBU-10
on each inboard
wing station and
a single AIM-9X
on the twin rails
on the outer
stations. Matthew
C. Hartman
Bottom: An
unmarked F-15SA
on the ramp at St
Louis, Missouri.
The aircraft has
an impressive
cocktail of
weapons
including GBU-54
laser JDAMs on
the conformal
tank stations,
AGM-84H/K
SLAM-ER, AIM-120
AMRAAM and
AGM-88 HARM
on the outer wing
station. Boeinghttp://www.combataircraft.net // May 2018 41
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