#AIR TO AIR COMBAT MANEUVERS PLUS#

A manoeuvre such as the ' low yo-yo' trades altitude for airspeed to gain closure on an enemy, and to decrease turn radius. By using such manoeuvres, a pilot will often make trade offs between the fighter’s potential energy (altitude), and kinetic energy (airspeed), to maintain the energy-to-weight ratio of the aircraft, or the 'specific energy'. Ī pilot in combat attempts to conserve his aircraft’s energy through carefully timed and executed manoeuvres. Also, the pilot must be aware of his wingman’s position, and maintain good communication.

Position of aircraft must quickly be assessed, including direction, angle off tail (the angle between flight paths), and closing speed. Variable limitations must also be considered, such as turn radius, turn rate, and the specific energy of the aircraft. Structural limitations of both the attacking and defending fighters must be taken into account, such as thrust-to-weight ratio, wing loading, and the 'corner speed' (the maximum/minimum speed at which the aircraft can attain the best turning performance). In Southeast Asia, over 85% of all kills are attributed to the attacker spotting and shooting the defender without ever being seen. There are five main things which a pilot must remain conscious of when contemplating an aerial engagement, of which, getting and keeping sight is the most important. The master rule is still the same: do not let your opponent get on your six o'clock, while attempting to get on his.Ĭlose-range combat tactics vary considerably according to the type of aircraft being used and the number of aircraft involved. However, close range fighting with infrared guided missiles and aircraft cannons still obey the same general rules laid down in the skies over Europe in the early 20th century. New manoeuvres have emerged, intending to break radar lock by minimizing the Doppler signature of one's own aircraft ('keeping the enemy at 3 or 9 o'clock'), or to exhaust the kinetic energy of an incoming missile (by changing the aircraft's course from side to side, the missile, not flying directly at target but trying to forestall it, will make sharper turns and eventually have to fly a longer path). Today's air combat is much more complicated than that of older times, as air-to-air missiles, radar, and automatic cannons capable of high rates of fire are used on virtually all modern fighter aircraft. Most of these rules are still as valuable nowadays as they were a century ago. He advised pilots to attack from the direction of the sun (toward which the defending pilot could not see), or to fly at a higher altitude than the opponent. Oswald Boelcke, a German fighter ace during World War I, was the first to publish the basic rules for aerial combat manoeuvring in 1916, known as the Dicta Boelcke. This type of combat became known as dogfighting.

#AIR TO AIR COMBAT MANEUVERS PLUS#

This is known as getting on an aircraft's six o'clock or tail, plus a wide variety of other terms, usually coined by air crews. Pilots achieved firing position while avoiding the threat of enemy guns by manoeuvring behind the enemy aircraft. A flying man may be able to loop and do all the stunts imaginable and yet he may not succeed in shooting down a single enemy.' One of the greatest 'aces' of World War I, Manfred von Richthofen (the Red Baron), wrote in his book The Red Fighter Pilot, 'The great thing in air fighting is that the decisive factor does not lie in trick flying but solely in the personal ability and energy of the aviator. As technology rapidly advanced, new young aviators began to define the realm of air-to-air combat, such as Max Immelmann, Oswald Boelcke, and Lanoe Hawker. Anthony Fokker inspected the wreckage and improved the design by connecting the firing mechanism of the gun to the timing of the engine, to allow the gun to fire through the propeller without hitting it. He achieved three kills, but was shot down by ground fire, landing behind German lines. Roland Garros, working with Morane Saulnier Aéroplanes, was the first to solve this problem by attaching steel deflector wedges to the propeller. įixed, forward-firing guns were found to be the most effective armament for most World War I era fighters, but were nearly impossible to fire through the spinning propeller without destroying it.

The need to stop reconnaissance by enemy aircraft rapidly led to the development of fighter planes, a class of aircraft designed specifically to destroy enemy aircraft. The pilot, Feldwebel Wilhelm Schlichting, was shot with a hand gun wielded by observer Louis Quenault, riding in a Voisin Type 3 piloted by French Sergeant Joseph Frantz. The first aircraft to be shot down by another aircraft, which occurred on October 5, 1914, was a German Aviatik. Early aerial combat consisted of aviators shooting at one another with hand held weapons. Military aviation appeared in World War I where aircraft were initially used to spot enemy troop concentrations, field gun positions and movements.

Air to air combat maneuvers