Hi everybody.
I had a question about the tightness of the Thunderbirds' formations over the years. I was looking at some older pics (not sure of the years) and the formations look ridiculously tight, but now the diamond looks like it has quite a bit of space between the planes. Did this change after the missile rail incident in Chicago?
http://img144.imageshack.us/my.php?imag ... 4mmru8.jpg
Sorry if this was answered before. I ran a search and didn't find anything.

The missle rail incident was not a big deal. There is at least one minor contact during each season its not always in front of the public eye.

The difference in tightness is called Phase I and Phase II. During the beginning of the season they fly a more relaxed and spread formation called Phase I. Once all the pilots on the team are comfortable and #7 agrees they can start flying Phase II tightness.

The team has not transitioned to phase II tightness for many years now, I think the last team to do it flew in 99'-00'.

So they can do it any time as long as the whole team feels they are ready to fly such a formation?
Thanks for the input, Burner.

502pilot wrote:So they can do it any time as long as the whole team feels they are ready to fly such a formation?

Yes and no. After review, evaluation and grading of the team, each individual maneuver and consistency, per the OpsO they have been "allowed" to fly tighter in years past. However, at the present, and to the best of my knowledge, the decision was made above the team to not fly any wing overlaps (i.e. Phase II).

Noteworthy is that contrary to when the Blue Angels fly wingtip to wingtip and their wingtips actually are the closest parts almost hitting each other, when the Tbirds tighten up it's the parts behind the pilot's head (similar to the dead angle while driving your car) that would collide with another pilot first. This could happen behind the Slot pilot's view as well, whereas with the Blues, Slot keeps an eye on everyone else. In other words horizontal slabs could bang the wingtip of another jet, as was the case in Chicago 2005. This formation did not look as tight as other ones previous years, yet they still collided! It was definitely a closer formation than the hair raising clips you can see from earlier years that use more stack or depth in the formation (much like the one you posted a link to). The reason it doesn't appear as tight is partly because the wingspan on the F-16 is only 31ft and much smaller than its Navy counterpart used by the Blue Angels. While on the subject, the Thunderbirds also use much less stack than the Blue Angels nowadays. Two different schools of close formation aerobatics you could say, while the Blues fly certain maneuvers closer to another aircraft and use the depth in the formation to create an optical illusion for the crowd, the Thunderbirds fly just as close together if you take the size of the aircraft into account (although their wingtips are further apart) and a flatter formation is used. Having said that, no one can argue that the Blues appear visually closer to each other than the Thunderbirds!

Hope that makes some sense!

Simple answer. That picture is the Pass in Review...if I am not mistaken, they try and get close and stable as possible for photos? Normally if its windy, they won't fly soo close. This is Andrews AFB 2007 Thunderbirds PiR.



I am just going by what I think the answer is...you guys probably know more than me about this anyways.

It was really windy both Sat. and Sun. but I thought they did a pretty good job. On saturday all 6 went up for a flight around Maryland to get a feel of the wind. I gotta admit, on saturday, walking along cutting my grandmothers lawn and outta nowhere the Thunderbirds flyover in a delta was PRETTY SWEET.

Lawndart wrote:

502pilot wrote:So they can do it any time as long as the whole team feels they are ready to fly such a formation?

Yes and no. After review, evaluation and grading of the team, each individual maneuver and consistency, per the OpsO they have been "allowed" to fly tighter in years past. However, at the present, and to the best of my knowledge, the decision was made above the team to not fly any wing overlaps (i.e. Phase II).

Noteworthy is that contrary to when the Blue Angels fly wingtip to wingtip and their wingtips actually are the closest parts almost hitting each other, when the Tbirds tighten up it's the parts behind the pilot's head (similar to the dead angle while driving your car) that would collide with another pilot first. This could happen behind the Slot pilot's view as well, whereas with the Blues, Slot keeps an eye on everyone else. In other words horizontal slabs could bang the wingtip of another jet, as was the case in Chicago 2005. This formation did not look as tight as other ones previous years, yet they still collided! It was definitely a closer formation than the hair raising clips you can see from earlier years that use more stack or depth in the formation (much like the one you posted a link to). The reason it doesn't appear as tight is partly because the wingspan on the F-16 is only 31ft and much smaller than its Navy counterpart used by the Blue Angels. While on the subject, the Thunderbirds also use much less stack than the Blue Angels nowadays. Two different schools of close formation aerobatics you could say, while the Blues fly certain maneuvers closer to another aircraft and use the depth in the formation to create an optical illusion for the crowd, the Thunderbirds fly just as close together if you take the size of the aircraft into account (although their wingtips are further apart) and a flatter formation is used. Having said that, no one can argue that the Blues appear visually closer to each other than the Thunderbirds!

Hope that makes some sense!

Although I don't know everything about the Thunderbirds, (trying to though ) I would have to agree with LD on this one. Although I never really learned about the decision being made ''above the team'' so to speak, I thought they did it if they were comfortable with doing so.

oh, and Viper..I wish sooooooooo badly I lived in a city where they performed, that would be AWESOME. Lucky man you are!

Even at Phase one it's damn close. One needs to balance the risk for the reward. Phase One is close enough IMO.

And I get the airshow any time I want in the offseason. Just gotta drive to Nellis