{"id":322,"date":"2017-12-24T12:00:10","date_gmt":"2017-12-24T19:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=322"},"modified":"2023-01-31T17:54:13","modified_gmt":"2023-02-01T00:54:13","slug":"true-story-fake-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?p=322","title":{"rendered":"Air-Minded: True Story, Fake Video"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>This is an older post, originally posted in March 2008, updated to correct some details I got wrong the first time around. \u2014Paul<\/em><\/p>\n<p>A friend sent me a link to this History Channel video, which has been circulating on the internet for several years:<\/p>\n<p><\/p><center><br>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/AJ76BSassms\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/center><br>\nHe wanted to know if the video was for real &#8230; can an F-15 really land with one wing missing?<p><\/p>\n<p>Sure it can. It&#8217;s been done. The incident the video&#8217;s built around occurred in 1983. The right wing of an Israeli Air Force F-15D Eagle was sheared off in a midair collision with an IAF A-4 Skyhawk. The pilot of the Skyhawk ejected; the crew of the crippled Eagle was able to land.<\/p>\n<p>The F-15 pilot flew final at something like 300 knots (normal speed&nbsp;150) and touched down at 250-260 knots (normal speed 120-130), in so doing proving that the F-15 flight control system really works! It helps that the entire underside of the F-15 fuselage is a flying surface. It also helps that the F-15 has three hydraulic systems and enormous horizontal stabs. No, one-winged flight isn&#8217;t impossible at all &#8230;&nbsp;but I&#8217;m glad it didn&#8217;t happen to me!<\/p>\n<p>Almost everything in the video is bogus, though. The aerial shots consist of stock footage of US Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles, not F-15C and D model Eagles, the aircraft involved in the mishap flight. There&#8217;s a glimpse of an old F-100, apparently meant to stand in for the A-4 the F-15 pilot collided with. The only countries still flying the Hun in 1983 were Denmark and Taiwan. Couldn&#8217;t&nbsp;the History Channel&nbsp;find stock footage of a Skyhawk?<\/p>\n<p>The cockpit shots are also borrowed, consisting of more USAF F-15E footage (that&#8217;s an F-15E stick, not an F-15C\/D stick). Ditto the HUD videos. When, in the interview, the pilot describes firing a missile, the video cuts away to footage of an F-15 launching a missile. The pilot was on a training flight against other IAF aircraft and his missile shot was simulated, not real.&nbsp;I guess whoever put the video together couldn&#8217;t resist throwing in dramatic footage of an actual missile launch.<\/p>\n<p>The shots of the guy in the back seat where you see something white streaming from where the wing should be?&nbsp;Faked. Also faked are the sequences of a one-wing F-15 flying and landing.&nbsp;I believe this was originally stock footage of&nbsp;an intact F-15 with the right wing photoshopped out and streaming white stuff photoshopped in. As far as I know there never was any video of the one-winged F-15 in flight.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a title=\"F-15-without-wing\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/halfmind\/49069399722\/in\/dateposted-public\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/49069399722_3c875e6880_z.jpg\" alt=\"F-15-without-wing\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\"><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This one&#8217;s real, at least.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The only thing I can verify as&nbsp;authentic are the still shots of the damaged IAF F-15 taken on the ground after it landed, because I saw those same photos when I was briefed on the midair shortly after the IAF&nbsp;concluded its investigation. Every other USAF F-15 pilot received the same briefing, and I think they&#8217;ll&nbsp;back me up when I say that there never was any video of the damaged jet flying or landing.<\/p>\n<p>My best guess: the History Channel wanted to make a story out of the incident, but with only those post-midair still photos and the interview with the pilot, they didn&#8217;t have enough. They added the rest to jazz up the presentation.<\/p>\n<p>Makes you wonder about some of the other &#8220;documentary footage&#8221; you see on TV.<\/p>\n\n\n<p><em>\u2014<a href=\"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/?page_id=14450\"><strong> back to the Air-Minded Index<\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is an older post, originally posted in March 2008, updated to correct some details I got wrong the first time around. \u2014Paul A friend sent me a link to this History Channel video, which has been circulating on the internet for several years: He wanted to know if the video was for real &#8230; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1960,3,16,14],"tags":[157,593],"class_list":["post-322","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-air-minded","category-flying","category-media","category-military","tag-air-minded","tag-aviation-accident"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=322"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32680,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322\/revisions\/32680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pwoodford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}