My mom and I used to sit at the end of the Eglin flight line and watch the F-4’s take off right above our heads. They were at several hundred feet by then but the roar and the vibration in your body was something to be experienced. I fell in love with the Phantom then and have been a fan ever since. It will always be my favorite Phighter. 🫡
Back in 1995 I was living in Lakenheath village, my father was the local doctor. I remember the F-111 Aardvarks making a hell of a noise when they took off. Great times. I now live near RAF Lakenheath and watch the F15e and F35a all the time.
Brilliant. We love watching the F15 and F35 standing right under the flightline as they land. Its great to see this. It reminds me of watching the F4's flying from Bentwaters with my late dad. RIP Ralph. Happy days.
Back in the early 70's my father flew F4's out of Bentwaters. We lived on base and can always recall when flights would take off from the roar of their engines. For a while, the school system at Bentwaters got shutdown so they bused us over to Lakenheath to use their classrooms. Lots of interesting memories of that time as a kid.
Thanks for sharing the video. All Phantoms in this video were from the 561st FS of the 57th FW from Nellis AFB. Sadley, the 561st retired all Phantoms about one year later, making the 561st the last active-duty F-4 Squadron in the USAF.
abs fantastic love Lakenheath first went in 1990 watching F1-11F's,loved watching Phantom displays at Mildenhall,Bentwaters,Upper Heyford,Wattisham & Alconbury airshows in the 80's & early 90's.was at Airfete 92 were one of the last FGR2 Phantom displays took place before retirement,what a beast of a fighter F4 4EVER
@@mattbates6887 definetly Matt ive still got the official airshow VHS with the other airshows i listed i used to be in a aviation video club back in the day still love watching them
@@stevecurd3944 Those VHS tapes must be great to watch. Did you go to the RAF Greenham Common RIAT NATO tiger meet in the mid 70s? There must have been well over 100 NATO jets on static display there, I remember some of them were painted in yellow and black tiger stripes. Was when the Greenham Common women peace protesters were there, camped out by the base. We passed by them, on the way into the airbase by car. The F-104 Starfighter display team were there, and the US Navy put on a great flying display with a F-14 Tomcat, Grumman A-6 Intruder and possibly but not 100% sure, a Vought RF-8G Crusader or possibly a Skyhawk. The US Navy F-14 , did a fantastic short takeoff demonstration, with NEAR VERTICAL climb on full reheat. Wow that was just amazing! 👍 Brilliant airshow on a very hot Sunday, with wall to wall sunshine! RAF Alconbury was great to, saw the SR-71 and Concorde flying there, absolutely brilliant! One thing I liked about Alconbury, was the HF aerial systems around the base, and an interesting looking conical shaped HF wire aerial system. I can still remember the very large HF Yagi antennas they had there, supported on very tall masts. RAF Mildenhall Sunday morning, pouring with heavy rain for most of the morning. USAF put on a great flying display with a B-1B and F-16 Falcon. Amazed to see the F-16 do a low level barrel roll in heavy rain. RAF Lakenheath right at the far right end of the runway by a large hanger, watched a F-16 awaiting clearance to take off, while a mini thunderstorm shower was slowly passing by. The F-16 was waiting there for quite a while as I remember, and at times the F-16 air intake sucked up rain water from the taxi way, which was quite interesting! Finally lol I could go on, the USAFE F-4 missing man display team at Lakenheath, absolulely brilliant!
@@mattbates6887 no i didnt Matt but must of been fantastic, the first airshow i went to was Mildenhall Airfete 1977 i always remember it because the SR-71 done a flypast but every year i went until 1997 with my Dad & Grandad who was ex RAF but my fav was 92 when the F-14 from VF-74 displayed & it was one of the last displays of a RAF F-4 & that F-4 has been restored & displayed at RAF Wattisham in a HAS but back then the variation of aircraft was amazing
by the tailcode there from the 561weapons squadron (fighter squadron) out of Nellis Afb,they were the last asctive unit to fly the wild weasel on operational missions before retirement in 1996
Back during "Desert Shield", my Captain ( Firefighters) was a Lt. Col. ,(Pilot) and Church member ( Crew Chief) with the 106th Rec. Squadron flying RF4C Phantoms. Flew out of Saudi Arabia I believe, anyway 1 of their Phantoms goes down with the loss of both crew. When they were replaced they left their jets for the Nevada Recee Sq. Their tail codes at the time were B/H for Birmingham. lots of F4 videos with a clip of their jets in them. Lon story short when I questioned each of them about the downed F4 they pulled me aside and told me it was Classified and they couldn't talk about it. Made me believe this was a blue on blue shoot down, or they were on a Classified mission and were shoot down by Iraq....
