Enjoy a few minutes of the unique sound of the veritable Jenny with its classic OX-5 Water-Cooled engine as it taxis out and takes to flight . . . each clip is of a different Jenny.  Except for their bright colors, these are identical to the planes flown by the First Aero Squadron out of the Columbus Airfield in late 1916 and early 1917.  Please click on each photo below to see its short video.  And make sure to turn on your sound!

                        Curtiss JN-4 Restored Jenny 2 Minute Video Clip Explaining Jenny Origins

ENJOY!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This aviation experience is thanks to our ever alert FASF member and former Marine Corps Jet Fighter Pilot, Jerry Dixon.  Jerry has given us some other fascinating aviation insights before, so we hope he and you other members will continue to bring us these interesting insights into the world of aviation.  THANK YOU JERRY!

Thanks again, Jerry, for the great and even specacular moving 360 degree panoramic view of the world’s largest airplane graveyard.  When your Webmaster first viewed the astounding aircraft storage facility as seen above, he couldn’t but marvel at and wonder about this large piece of American Military History, especially how these planes helped the U.S. maintain the peace during the Cold War era and of the literallly thousands of young Americans who trained in and then flew all of these pieces of aviation and American history over the years.  Also not overlooked is the massive amount of tax-payer funding that went into generating these thousands of war planes!

Several of you have wondered at why some of these ships aren’t being loaned out or gifted to the many aviation dedicated museums throughout the U.S. and even abroad.  Please let us know your feelings about this question right here,  online and inside our “LEAVE A REPLY” fields, which you will find on most of our website’s pages.  We always love to hear from you!

 

We thought you would like a peek at some of the large collection of historical photos of General Cardenas taken over a span of some 75 years.  We’ll put them on the website from time to time.  The complete collection of the General’s digitized personal historical photos was gathered together for this website through the efforts of FASF Member, Gene Savino, a San Diego based Technology Consultant. Gene was kind enough to take time out of his busy work schedule to visit with the General so he could collect some of the photos you see below.  We would like to thank both General Cardenas and Mr. Savino for providing these historical photos for our use.

As many of you already know, the General was actually born in Mérida, Yukatán, Mexico, in 1920!.  When he was only five, his parents moved to San Diego, in the United States.  Today, the General is retired and once again lives in the beloved town where he was raised and schooled.  Gene was very impressed at meeting the General for the first time, remarking that it was hard to believe he was almost 96 years old – “He was very sharp, friendly and engaging – and appeared like a man half his age,” reported Savino. 

Remember: To see any of the photos shown here in higher resolution, just click on them.

From time to time this FASF website, and also the Aerodrome, will feature stories about this extraordinary Air Force Senior Officer, who remains, today, a living legend as well as a brilliant oral historian of America’s – and of his own – role in the history of Word War II.  The General would appear to have lived the classical but not often witnessed “American Dream.”  He is a genuine hero for not just his exploits during both WWII and Vietnam, but also for his bravery in test piloting some radically new and highly dangerous aircraft during his long career as an Air Force Test Pilot.  The General was an active member of the small team of elite pilots who were responsible for the first human flight to successully break the mysterious and once daunting Sound Barrier.

You can read more about General Cardenas’ unusual career on our Board of Advisor’s Page right here.

An interesting footnote to General Cardenas’ story is that he has some roots in New Mexico.  He was actually promoted to full Colonel while at the University of New Mexico working for his engineering degree.

 

Courtesy of the GUARDIAN Newspaper of Great Britain.

Click on the Above Photo of Tracy Curtis-Taylor to See Short 42 second Video Clip of her

A woman British aviator has touched down in Sydney, completing her 21,000km solo flight from England in a vintage open cockpit biplane.

“I need a drink. And I need a hairdresser,” Tracey Curtis-Taylor said as she climbed out of her 1942 Boeing Stearman, Spirit of Artemis, to cheers and applause at the Sydney, Austraila airport on Saturday.

The 53-year-old pilot has flown across 23 countries, making 50 refuelling stops, since she set off from Farnborough in Hampshire, southern England, in October.

Her mission was to emulate the pioneering British aviator Amy Johnson, who became the first woman to fly solo from Britain to Australia in 1930.

Curtis-Taylor’s route took her across Europe and the Mediterranean to Jordan, over the Arabian desert, across the Gulf of Oman to Pakistan, India and across Asia.

Encountering treacherous weather and navigating the politics of the airways were the toughest parts of the trip, she said.

She said of one leg near Bucharest: “Flying in heavy rain, low cloud on the deck … that was a death trap that killed a lot of the airline pilots. So I turned around and went back.”

The highlights far outweighed the frustrations, she said. She rated looking down on Uluru as one of her top six moments, which also included flying across the Dead Sea in formation with an F16 Israeli military pilot. “That was amazing,” she said.

Before starting her flight, Curtis-Taylor said in October: “For my whole life, I have been moved by the achievements of pioneers like Amy Johnson.

“My own flight to Australia is the realisation of a burning desire to fly my beloved Boeing Stearman around the world following in their footsteps,” she told Press Association.

She has recreated the essence of Johnson’s era of flying, with an open cockpit, stick and rudder flying with basic period instruments and a short range between landing points.

She is not unfamiliar with this form of flying. She flew 13,000km solo from Cape Town to the UK in 2013, recreating the 1928 flight of Lady Mary Heath.

“I’m tired, it’s been a pretty intense week with all the build-up to the final arrival, I’m relieved, euphoric, it’s great to be here,” she said after completing her latest journey.

Johnson had been a great inspiration to her throughout, she said. “You can’t do this without a great sense of empathy and sympathy for what she went through, what she achieved is so brilliant.

“I just take my hat off to what she pushed herself to, right on the limits of endurance. She was on the verge of nervous exhaustion when she finished, it’s an astonishing survival story, all done by a slip of a girl at the age of 26 with little flying experience. This generation needs to know what the pioneers achieved and how they resolved to break the records.”

Curtis-Taylor, originally from Stamford in Lincolnshire, but who grew up in Cumbria and now lives in London, said other highlights of her journey included flying over the the Arabian desert, the mountains of Burma and the coastline of Thailand.

She said: “It blew me away, I feel I have been privileged to have experienced this but I haven’t had the time to process it yet. I would like to sit down with a large drink and rest and reflect on what I have gone through. It’s been an astonishing experience – heaven and hell.”

She said that despite having just completed the exhausting trip, she still had the drive to make further expeditions. “What I would really like to do is get back in the airplane and fly up the east coast of Australia. I wish I could keep going, I never want to land as the experience is so profound, it’s addictive,” she said.

I am still in expedition mode, but I need to relax and decompress.”

She said she would travel to New Zealand to celebrate her mother’s 80th birthday before joining her aircraft in Seattle for a coast-to-coast expedition across the US. “Why not keep going? Life should be about big projects,” she said.

Watch this fascinating brief 5 minute Interview with fighter pilot, Jerry Yellin, who flew the last mission of WWII, one from Iwo Jima to Japan.  It was taped on that same famous island from which came that iconic view so often seen of the six heroic Marines raising the stars and stripes in victory over Mt. Suribachi. The interview was made for the 70th anniversary of that last world war’s ending in 1945.

Listen carefully to what Jerry Yellin says – and how he says it. You might wonder how many still surviving WWII veterans have kept themselves in such good condition for so long and can still fit into the uniforms they so proudly wore 70 years ago. Take note of his superb and articulate delivery, no teleprompter, just a 91 year old former Army Air Corps fighter pilot representing that great generation which went abroad to successfully protect our personal liberties and freedoms against the axis powers. This former Army Aviator has a few surprises and a clearly admirable personal philosophy.

To see Captain Yellin’s 70th War Ending Anniversary Interview, just click on his image below.  This video interview comes to us from FASF Media Scout, James Purcell, of Detroit, Michigan and courtesy of the Defense Department’s “DVIDS” production team, Corporal Isaac Ibarra, was the Videographer.

In this writer’s long experience as a pilot, especially of multi-engine seaplanes, I have NEVER seen this degree of extreme skill at performing a stunt seaplane landing.  It is incredible. Many thanks to one of our top aviation scouts, FASF member, Doc Edwards, we are bringing you this extraordinary, almost unbelievable stunt pilot doing what seems impossible.  Amazing, but enough said. See this for yourself.  Just click on the photo below which we took from this remarkable short (1:39 minute) video and you will witness this unbelievable lake landing.  This amazing short video was taken during the Scalaria Air Challenge in Austria. This large German Dornier “DO-24 Latina” seaplane managed to go from 97 (112 MPH) knots to a complete stop in only 265 feet – – – and even added a near 360 degree spin at the end of the stunt landing as a special bonus surprise.  If anyone who sees this knows the pilot’s name, we’d love to recognize him here for his exceptional “extreme” piloting skill. His trick landing looks as though it’s a calamitous  crash – but it’s not!

DATELINE COLUMBUS FASF HEADQUARTERS – December 8, 2015

The FASF was just notified by the U. S. Army’s 1st Armored Division’s CAB unit (Combat Aviation Brigade) that they have just been ordered to deploy into the battle zones of the Mideast.  The CAB unit is presently headquartered at BIGGS ARMY AIR FIELD adjacent to and part of FORT BLISS, in El Paso, Texas, which is only about 80 air miles due East of Columbus.

The CAB and the FASF had been in the planning stages for an AIR SHOW in which some of the CAB’s helicopter gunships and other rotary wing assets would be demonstrated during the March 12, 2016 Centennial Commemoration of the Birth of American Air Power here in Columbus, NM.  It was 99 years ago that the U. S. Army’s Signal Corps, which had been operating its highly experimental early Curtiss manufactured Jenny biplanes in Texas City, Texas (near Houston) was ordered, by President Wilson, to immediately deploy its aircraft to Columbus for their first action in a sustained combat operation.

While this sudden removal of the CAB from the Air Show Schedule is a large disappointment, the FASF wishes the men and women of the CAB the best of good luck in their new battle field duty assignment.  We fully realize that this Battalion’s first priority, in fact its sole purpose for existence, it to be on a 24 hour daily standby in the event of any emergency call in the furtherance of national defense.  When the BIGG’s CAB returns to its home base in El Paso, we hope we will once again be able to plan another demonstration project to be held at the First Aero Squadron’s historic Air Field in Columbus.

Here, below is a short 4:12  minute action clip of the nearby CAB unit to help you get an idea of their actual combat operations. Simply click on the CAB’s Official Combat Emblem or on any of the other still shots from their video to see this video.

Our VP, Roy Mantei, ever on the alert for interesting historical pieces, let us know that the Deming Headlight newspaper just published an interesting story about the Northern Luna County’s Deming Airport WWII activities.  The story was submitted to the paper’s editor, Bill Armendariz, by Ms. June Loretto, of the Deming Writers’ Group (DWG), which until now, we didn’t know existed.

The story got us thinking, and particularly about the theme that the Deming Airport, known during WWII as the Deming Army Air Field. Unlike the article, which might be interpreted to describe the field as a Bomber Pilot and Bombardier Training center, in reality it was, according to our resources and memory, actually used to train only Bombardiers, not pilots.  At right, in the blue the circle, is the colorful yet ghostly or spooky appearing cartoon depicting the Army Air Field’s training Shoulder Patch.  Notice that the black-robed character is holding a bomb in his left hand.

The Headlight story is definitely an interesting insight into Luna County’s long involvement in the history of American Air Power, which we all of course know was actually first launched back in 1916 in the small First Aero Squadron based border town of Columbus, only 30 miles South of Deming with its much later arriving and larger WWII Army Airfield Bombardier training facility.

Activated on November 15, 1942, the Deming field conducted Bombardier training for United States Army Air Forces Gulf Coast Training Center (later Central Flying Command).  The first class of newly qualified bombardiers graduated on March 6th of that year. In the next three years an estimated 12,000 cadets passed through the Deming Bombardier school. The airplane used at Deming to train the Bombardiers was the Beechcraft  AT-11, a fully restored and operational model of which is pictured (courtesy of Airliners.net) immediately below.  This plane later evolved into the similar looking and highly renowned Beechcraft C-45 Military Executive Transport twin.  It’s civilian counterpart, a corporate ship, was called the C-18.Looking above at the plane’s nose, you can see where the young Army cadets practiced and honed their Bombardier skills.  It was here, squatting in that nose window, that they learned to use our famously accurate and deadly Norden Bomb Sights.  This highly secret bombsight played a major role in helping the U.S. lead the Allies to victory in WWII.  Below is a young bombardier posing with his Norden Bombsight.  In his training aircraft, the Beech AT-11, he had far less room to lounge about.

Here, for your historical perusing, is an actual Class Book, “The Blue Ox,” of one of the Field’s graduating groups of Cadets.  Just click on the image of the book’s cover below to explore this Class Book’s pages and take a 72 year step back in time. The entire Book has been scanned into PDF format for your convenience.  You’ll only need the free Adobe Acrobat or other PDF Reader to enjoy this Class Book’s fascinating pages and historical photos.

Without further ado, here’s the Deming Headlight Story about the Deming Airport’s WWII beginnings . . .

---

Ghosts of Army Airfield

DEMING – June Loretto for the Headlight. December 7, 2015

Toward the southern horizon, just behind the Deming Airport runways and on what is now known as Raymond Reed Blvd., stand three World War II-era hangars. The hangars, a red and white water tower and several scattered 1940s-era buildings remain as landmarks where the Deming Army Air Field once filled the acreage from the current Deming Soccer Fields all the way to the Southwestern New Mexico State Fairgrounds.

The Deming Army Air Field was a bombardier training unit for cadets from around the country. The air field’s main objective was to prepare the cadets to fly (in)* twin engine bombers such as B-25s. The twin-engine, twin-tailed plane they trained on was the A-11 built by Beechcraft (and nicknamed the Kansan (the home state of Beech Aircraft Manufacturing Company).

Each class was comprised of 150 to 200 cadets, and after 18 weeks of intensive training, each cadet graduated with Second Lieutenant Bars and received the Spread Eagle to adorn their caps.

Jack Holmes (pictured above on left), a Deming resident, now 88, shared a few treasured memories of the time he worked at the air field when he was still a high school student. He worked the summers between 1943-45 as a general laborer or as they say, “gopher.”

Although it burned down in 1948, he said a much larger hangar existed just west of the three surviving today. The foundation lies where the hangar once stood. Jack described the size by mentioning that it could hold four B-25s.

Included in the cadet bombardier’s training was an exercise to skip bombs along the desert floor like stones skip over a pond.

Holmes recalled a training exercise where 100-pound bombs were used. They held five or ten pounds of black powder to ninety or so of sand. In one of the bombing exercises, one pilot followed too close behind another pilot at the bombing range. As the following pilot took his turn and took his bombing dive, the previous pilot’s bomb’s detonation blew out the bottom of his plane and blew a hole clear threw one of his wings. Fortunately, the pilot was not injured and managed to fly the wrecked aircraft back to the base.

Repairs were finished and the plane was tested to insure that its landing gear and flaps could open and close, according to Holmes. After passing a vigorous examination, the plane returned to service. To everyone’s shock, the same plane came back to the hangar within a day or two with the same damage.

Once the allies secured a victory in Europe (V-E Day), May 8, 1945, a reassignment of P-38s from Europe to the Pacific theater took place. The Deming Army Air Field stripped the camouflage paint from the aircraft as a means to shield them from detection as they flew toward their targets over the waters of the Pacific.

One evening, about 25 planes took off heading west for a night bombing exercise. As all the planes flew off into the distance, Holmes said he saw a sky full of red navigation lights. “What a sight, he said.

How many of us will ever see something as thrilling? Holmes‘ memories remind us of the generation that witnessed the Day of Infamy, December 7, 1941.  Stories from men in their late 90s who participated during the war years still circulate, but soon all those first-hand memories will be silent.

The hangars rising out of the desert landscape are a symbol of a group of gallant men who flew into the face of war from the Deming Army Airfield.

“By The Way…” columns are written by members of the Deming Writers Group (DWG).

• This parenthetical insertion by us of the preposition “in” is necessary, because,  without it, the sentence can easily infer that the cadets are learning to fly the airplanes, rather than ride in them in order to solely perform the responsibilities of bombardiers.

 

 

 

 

This story is thanks to the sharp eyes and recommendations of FASF member, and former USAF jet pilot and Airline driver, Virg Hemphill.  Thanks Virg!

SR-71 Blackbird

In April 1986, following an attack on American

soldiers in a Berlin disco, President Reagan

ordered the bombing of Muammar Qaddafi’s

terrorist camps in Libya .

My duty was to fly over Libya , and take

photographs recording the damage our F-111’s

had inflicted.

Qaddafi had established a ‘line of death,’

a territorial marking across the Gulf of Sidra ,

swearing to shoot down any intruder, that crossed

the boundary.

On the morning of April 15, I rocketed past the line at 2,125 mph.

I was piloting the SR-71 spy plane, the world’s

fastest jet, accompanied by a Marine Major (Walt),

the aircraft’s reconnaissance systems officer (RSO).

We had crossed into Libya , and were approaching

our final turn over the bleak desert landscape, when

Walt informed me, that he was receiving missile

launch signals.

I quickly increased our speed, calculating the time

it would take for the weapons, most likely SA-2 and SA-4

surface-to-air missiles, capable of Mach 5 – to reach

our altitude. I estimated that we could beat the rocket-powered

missiles to the turn, and stayed our course, betting

our lives on the plane’s performance.

After several agonizingly long seconds, we made

the turn and blasted toward the Mediterranean ….

‘You might want to pull it back,’ Walt suggested.

It was then that I noticed I still had the throttles

full forward.

The plane was flying a mile every 1.6 seconds, well

above our Mach 3.2 limit.

It was the fastest we would ever fly.

I pulled the throttles to idle, just south of Sicily ,

but we still overran the refuelling tanker, awaiting us

over Gibraltar …

 

Scores of significant aircraft have been produced,

in the 100 years of flight, following the achievements

of the Wright brothers, which we celebrate in

December.

Aircraft such as the Boeing 707, the F-86 Sabre Jet,

and the P-51 Mustang, are among the important machines,

that have flown our skies.

But the SR-71, also known as the Blackbird, stands alone

as a significant contributor to Cold War victory, and as the

fastest plane ever, and only 93 Air Force pilots, ever steered

the ‘sled,’ as we called our aircraft.

 

The SR-71, was the brainchild of Kelly Johnson,

the famed Lockheed designer, who created the

P-38, the F-104 Starfighter, and the U-2.

After the Soviets shot down Gary Powers U-2 in 1960,

Johnson began to develop an aircraft, that would

fly three miles higher, and five times faster, than

the spy plane, and still be capable of photographing

your license plate.

However, flying at 2,000 mph would create intense heat

on the aircraft’s skin.

Lockheed engineers used a titanium alloy, to construct

more than 90 percent of the SR-71, creating special tools,

and manufacturing procedures to hand-build each of the

40 planes… (Wow ! ! ! 40 planes???? I thought only 7.)

Special heat-resistant fuel, oil, and hydraulic fluids, that

would function at 85,000 feet, and higher, also had to be

developed.

In 1962, the first Blackbird successfully flew, and

in 1966, the same year I graduated from high school,

the Air Force began flying operational SR-71 missions.

I came to the program in 1983, with a sterling record

and a recommendation from my commander,

completing the weeklong interview, and meeting

Walt, my partner for the next four years.

He would ride four feet behind me, working all the

cameras, radios, and electronic jamming equipment.

I joked, that if we were ever captured, he was the spy,

and I was just the driver.

He told me to keep the pointy end forward.

We trained for a year, flying out of Beale AFB in

California, Kadena Airbase in Okinawa , and RAF

Mildenhall in England …

On a typical training mission, we would take off near

Sacramento, refuel over Nevada, accelerate into Montana,

obtain a high Mach speed over Colorado , turn right over

New Mexico, speed across the Los Angeles Basin, run up

the West Coast, turn right at Seattle , then return to Beale.

Total flight time: Two Hours and Forty Minutes.

One day, high above Arizona , we were monitoring

the radio traffic of all the mortal airplanes below us.

First, a Cessna pilot asked the air traffic controllers

to check his ground speed. ‘Ninety knots,’ ATC replied.

A Bonanza soon made the same request.

‘One-twenty on the ground,’ was the reply.

To our surprise, a navy F-18 came over the radio, with a

ground speed check.

I knew exactly what he was doing.

Of course, he had a ground speed indicator in his cockpit,

but he wanted to let all the bug-smashers in the valley,

know what real speed was, ‘Dusty 52, we show you at 620

on the ground,’ ATC responded.

The situation was too ripe.

I heard the click of Walt’s mike button in the rear seat.

In his most innocent voice, Walt startled the controller

by asking for a ground speed check from 81,000 feet,

clearly above controlled airspace.

In a cool, professional voice, the controller replied,

‘Aspen 20, I show you at 1,982 knots on the ground.’

We did not hear another transmission on that

frequency, all the way to the coast.

The Blackbird always showed us something new,

each aircraft possessing its own unique personality.

In time, we realized we were flying a national treasure.

When we taxied out of our revetments for take-off,

people took notice.

Traffic congregated near the airfield fences, because

everyone wanted to see, and hear the mighty SR-71.

You could not be a part of this program, and not come

to love the airplane.

Slowly, she revealed her secrets to us, as we earned

her trust.

One moonless night, while flying a routine training

mission over the Pacific, I wondered what the sky

would look like from 84,000 feet, if the cockpit lighting

were dark.

While heading home on a straight course, I slowly turned

down all of the lighting, reducing the glare and revealing

the night sky.

Within seconds, I turned the lights back up, fearful that the

jet would know, and somehow punish me.

But my desire to see the sky, overruled my caution,

I dimmed the lighting again.

To my amazement, I saw a bright light outside

my window.

As my eyes adjusted to the view, I realized that the

brilliance was the broad expanse of the Milky Way,

now a gleaming stripe across the sky.

Where dark spaces in the sky, had usually existed,

there were now dense clusters, of sparkling stars.

Shooting Stars, flashed across the canvas every

few seconds.

It was like a fireworks display with no sound.

I knew I had to get my eyes back on the instruments,

and reluctantly, I brought my attention back inside.

To my surprise, with the cockpit lighting still off,

I could see every gauge, lit by starlight.

In the plane’s mirrors, I could see the eerie shine of

my gold spacesuit, incandescently illuminated, in a

celestial glow.

I stole one last glance out the window.

Despite our speed, we seemed still before the

heavens, humbled in the radiance of a much greater

power.

For those few moments, I felt a part of something far

more significant, than anything we were doing in the plane.

The sharp sound of Walt’s voice on the radio, brought me

back to the tasks at hand, as I prepared for our descent.

San Diego Aerospace Museum

The SR-71 was an expensive aircraft to operate.

The most significant cost was tanker support, and in 1990, confronted with budget cutbacks, the Air

Force retired the SR-71.

The SR-71 served six presidents, protecting America

for a quarter of a century.

Unbeknown to most of the country, the plane flew

over North Vietnam , Red China , North Korea , the

Middle East, South Africa , Cuba , Nicaragua , Iran , Libya ,

and the Falkland Islands .

On a weekly basis, the SR-71, kept watch over every

Soviet Nuclear Submarine, Mobile Missile Site,

and all of their troop movements.

It was a key factor in winning the Cold War.

I am proud to say, I flew about 500 hours in this

aircraft. I knew her well.

She gave way to no plane, proudly dragging her

Sonic Boom through enemy backyards, with great impunity.

She defeated every missile, outran every MIG, and always

brought us home.

In the first 100 years of manned flight, no aircraft was more remarkable.

The Blackbird had outrun nearly 4,000 missiles, not once taking a scratch from enemy fire.

On her final flight, the Blackbird, destined for

the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum ,

sped from Los Angeles to Washington

in 64 Minutes, averaging 2,145 mph, and

setting four speed records.

Courtesy of the Arizona Republic Newspaper, Phoenix, AZ. November 26, 2015

All F-16 Photos below are courtesy of the United States Air Force

An F-16 fighter jet under the command of the 56th Fighter Wing at Luke Air Force Base crashed in New Mexico on Wednesday morning.

The student pilot ejected from the craft and was examined at a hospital, said Luke spokesman Maj. Matthew Hasson.

“All indications at this point are that he’s in good condition, but obviously, ejecting out of an aircraft going at a high speed, you want to make sure everything’s squared away,” Hasson said.

The pilot, stationed at Holloman Air Force Base in southern New Mexico, was on a training mission northwest of Salinas Peak when the plane crashed. The cause was not immediately known.

The Air Force was in the beginning stages of assembling a crash-investigation team to review the matter, Hasson said.

“They’ll go out there, go through everything and determine what happened,” he said.

The Air Force did not disclose the name or any other details about the pilot. Only the student pilot was in the plane, and no injuries were reported on the ground. The student pilot ejected at approximately 8:45 a.m., as an instructor pilot trailed in another plane.

The $22.7 million Fighting Falcon crashed on a military range about 45 miles north of the base, Hasson said. The F-16 was part of the 54th Fighter Group, which is under the command of the 56th Fighter Wing at Luke.

The crash marked the second F-16 affiliated with Luke to crash in roughly two years. The Air Force blamed pilot error for a crash near Luke on June 26, 2013.

In that incident, an instructor pilot and a student pilot safely ejected from a two-seat, single-engine F-16 before it flew unmanned on a roughly nine-mile loop northwest of the base, according to the accident investigation team’s findings.

The plane circled back, lost altitude and cratered into a dirt field just outside the base. Investigators determined three small birds flew into the jet’s engine, resulting in “degraded engine performance” shortly after takeoff on a touch-and-go training exercise.

Officials blamed the crash on the instructor pilot’s handling of the aircraft after the bird strikes. “The board president found by clear and convincing evidence that the cause of the mishap was decision-making error by the (instructor pilot),” the investigative report said at the time.

The instructor pilot erroneously chose to climb while making a hard right turn in an attempt to get 3,000 and 5,000 feet above ground level, from which he could make an emergency landing, according to the report.

The maneuver robbed the plane of altitude and airspeed, investigators said.

The pilot should have kept flying straight and climbed to 7,000 to 10,000 feet above ground level, which would have given him more speed and time to recover control before attempting an emergency landing, according to the report.

The pilot in the 2013 incident did not face discipline and was not publicly identified.

Luke officials are in the process of transitioning most of the base’s F-16s to Holloman to make room for its expanding fleet of F-35 Lightning II fighter jets. As of last month, Luke had 79 F-16s and 32 F-35s, Hasson said.

Holloman had 56 F-16s before the crash.