airtraffic

Author Topic: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.  (Read 7928 times)

Offline Zackmoe

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F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« on: November 19, 2007, 01:39:40 AM »
I was headed out of town today and swung by MSY to show my girlfriend my spotting places (she's very understanding of my geekdom). We were sitting by the departure end of 19 and watched a Gulfstream IV go and then a Southwest 737. I didn't think I saw anything new taxiing our way, but then I caught a glimpse of something sleek and low, obscured by the fence at first. As it got closer, I realized it was an F-5!! And when he took off, man, the ground really shook. I didn't see any obvious markings of any air force that I could recognize, so I was wondering if it was privately owned. I listened to the archives, but couldn't pick up an N-number. I only got the Southwest pilot who took off after the F-5 inquiring as to what that thing was that took off in front of him. Its at the very end of this archive:

http://archive-server.liveatc.net/kmsy/KMSY-Nov-18-2007-1830Z.mp3

Anybody have any ideas who this thing could belong to?



Offline tyketto

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #1 on: November 19, 2007, 02:11:07 AM »

Very good question here, and I surely don't have any idea.

Did you hear any comms between ATC and the F-5 pilot? If not, more than likely they were communicating on UHF, and I don't know if the operator of the feed is using a UHF/VHF scanner or not.

My guess is that it is military.

BL.

Offline aevins

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #2 on: November 19, 2007, 02:14:54 PM »
Theres a military base around the airport, not sure where exactly, but I remember being shown where it was on the TRACON's scopes

Offline tyketto

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #3 on: November 19, 2007, 02:53:59 PM »
Theres a military base around the airport, not sure where exactly, but I remember being shown where it was on the TRACON's scopes

KNBG is 5nm NE of KMSY, at least according to AirNav. It would pose the question that if that particular F-5 was a Navy jet, why would it opt to land at the civilian/commercial airport than the Naval station...

BL.

Offline cactushp

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #4 on: November 19, 2007, 05:50:54 PM »
I believe there are some white painted NASA F-5's...they occasionally stop by at KIWA.

Offline KMSY

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #5 on: November 19, 2007, 09:06:29 PM »
For some reason or another MSY gets a lot of military traffic, even though there's a naval reserve base across the river (the aforementioned KNGB, to the southeast). The NG A-10s do touch and goes every once in a while. I've seen C-130s do em too. Couldn't tell you why. There are absolutely no military facilities on the field at MSY. It's not like there's a runway shortage at the naval base either. Their longest is 9999 ft. Maybe they're just bored. Don't know.

I think tomorrow morning, I'll go add the UHF counterparts. 'Cause on more than one occasion I've been disappointed that i didn't have them punched in. I'll look through the archives and do some research and see what I can get. Trust me, I'm just as curious as you all.
« Last Edit: November 19, 2007, 09:11:41 PM by KMSY »

Offline mhawke

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #6 on: November 20, 2007, 10:02:13 AM »
If they were Navy F-5's, they must be National Gaurd.  The F-5's were always used as the aggressor squadrons for training because they had similar performance characteristics to a Mig.  It also insured the the aggressor planes during training had different characteristics then the people being trained (typically in F-18's for Navy now, used to be F-14 and F-18).  Anyways, that taught the fighter pilot how to compensate for a plane with different handling then his own.

Short of it, they now use F-16's for aggressor squadrons because of them being more modern, thrust to weight ratio closer to current, etc.  But the F-5's were moved to the reserves/national gaurd for continued use as aggressor because they are cheaper for them to maintain and keep flying, while offering the same advantages that they had for active duty training before.

I realize none of this answers why they may have been at KMSY, but I thought it may make interesting background information.

Offline Zackmoe

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Re: F-5 Departs MSY Sunday Just Before 1:00 P.M.
« Reply #7 on: November 20, 2007, 04:16:05 PM »
Thanks to everyone for the great discussion! The F-5 wasn't white, but it didn't have any sort of markings that I could recognize as Air Force, Navy, or National Guard. This led me to believe (backed up by your replies) that it was either privately owned or part of some sort of OPFOR used for training (We all remember the "Migs" from the movie Top Gun). It was in a camo, brownish, maybe a desert camo. It sure was a beautiful thing to see it rocket into the sky.