I agree completely. I've studied military craft extensively as a hobby (wanted to be a pilot when I was young, but don't have 20/20 vision) and I can say that of all the fighters I've seen, the F/A-22 is the most impressive. A lot of thought and work went into this craft, and it's truly worthy as a 5th generation fighter. People compare it to the Eurofighter Typhoon a lot, and while that's a nice fighter in its own right, it just doesn't come close to the Raptor.

Also shown in the video is the A-10 Thunderbolt II, which is also a beautiful design in my eyes, except for completely different reasons. It's a monster of a plane, and it can take a ton of damage without going down, while dealing a ton of damage to ground targets. And despite that, it's relatively inexpensive.

I saw a show on History Channel (or Discovery?) on this plane. Pilots hate going up against the Raptor in training because they are always "killed" before they even know the Raptor is there. They talked of sending up to 5 fighters at once against a single Raptor, and the Raptor spanks them all every time. So yeah, pretty incredible aircraft. Inexpensive? http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/f-22-cost.htm

Airshow vids are usually only interesting/exciting to the people that shot it, but this one was pretty decent.

Fletch, I was referring to the A-10 in that last paragraph. I know the Raptor is anything but inexpensive.

Doh! Sorry.

truly beautiful...
especially that formation flight with the mustang leading.
Was wondering though : Wouldn't that P-51 be close to full throttle in order for the p-15 and p-22 to maintain envelope?
Could you shine some lights on this Sylvester_Ink ?

Well, I don't know quite as much about propeller-driven aircraft, but I shouldn't think it would be an issue. Jets can fly surprisingly slow, and the speed it takes for most of them to take off is generally around 100-130mph (off the top of my head), so a decently slow speed, like maybe 150-170mph should be more than enough to keep them in the air. (As long as there's enough air flowing over the wings to provide enough lift to compensate for the plane's weight.) The max speed of a Mustang is around 400mph and its cruise speed is around 350mph, (thank you Wikipedia!) and that would be more than enough to keep the heaviest of the jets in the air. (The A-10 has no worries, as its wing-design naturally gives it plenty of lift even at low speeds.)

Also, my bad about referring to the Raptor as the F/A-22. It was changed back to the F-22, but I'm still used to the old designation.

F/A-22!? You son of a ...!

Good vid.

It has got to take some powerful nads to do that stuff.

thanks Sylvester man,
it all makes sense. I know a bit about propelled planes (having played so many WWII sims) but i didnt have any reference point to the jet era, which i know much less...
I do have 20/20 vision though !
thanks again

*dead

This published video has been declared non-functional; embed code must be fixed within 2 days or it will be sent to the dead pool - declared dead by kulpims.