It’s a ground effect hydrofoil sea plane inter island electric ferry concept, so it’s near its limit in the video.
Ground effect refers to a flight characteristic noticed at low altitudes where the air below the wing compresses between the wing and ground, creating enormous lift with smaller wings or winglets. This makes them much more efficient, especially at lower speeds or with heavy loads.
The largest I know of is the Ecronoplan- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lun-class_ekranoplan)

Here’s a bit more info
https://www.hawaiiseaglider.org/

Many “birds” make use of this flight characteristic to save battery power during long term surveillance flights, especially just offshore.

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Published on Apr 14, 2016

The aerobatics skills of Russian pilots over the US destroyer Donald Cook in the Baltic Sea left the Pentagon and other US official running for cover in Washington over “aggressive close interactions” with Russian fighters jets.
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Releasing the footage of Russian jet flybys in the vicinity of the destroyer, the US Navy said that its vessel has encountered multiple “aggressive flight maneuvers ...within close proximity of the ship,” some as close as 30 feet (10 meters) on Monday and Tuesday.

The set of incidents took place as the US ship, which had sailed from the Polish port of Gdynia, was conducting exercises with its NATO ally Poland in the Baltic Sea. The Navy announced that the SU-24 first flew over Donald Cook on Monday as US sailors were rehearsing “deck landing drills with an allied [Polish] military helicopter”. The numerous close-range, low altitude encounters were witnessed at 3:00pm local time, forcing the commander of the ship to suspend helicopter refueling on the deck until the Russian jets departed the area.

The next day, the Navy said, Russia caused concern among US sailors when a Russian KA-27 Helix helicopter flew seven times over the ship at low altitude in international waters at around 5:00pm. Some 40 minutes later, two Russian SU-24 jets allegedly made a further 11 “close-range and low altitude passes”.

“The Russian aircraft flew in a simulated attack profile and failed to respond to repeated safety advisories in both English and Russian. USS Donald Cook’s commanding officer deemed several of these maneuvers as unsafe and unprofessional,” the Navy said.

Judging by the videos released by the US Navy, the sailors were nonplussed by the Russian aerobatic skills. They gathered on the top deck of the destroyer to watch the Russian pilots.

“He is on the deck below the bridge lane...It looks like he’ll be coming in across the flight deck, coming in low, bridge wing level...Over the bow, right turn, over the bow...” the voiceover on the footage states in what looks more like an instructor’s advice on how to maneuver in open waters, rather than the panic that the central command presented it to be. At least on the video no one can be seen running for cover.

According to a US defense official who spoke with Defense News, sailors aboard the Donald Cook claimed that the Russian jets’ low altitude stirred waters and created wake underneath the ship. US personnel on the American vessels, also claimed that Su-24 was “wings clean,” meaning no armaments were present on the Russian jets that could have posed a threat to US operations in the Baltic.

Yet at the same time, the official noted, that this week's incidents are “more aggressive than anything we’ve seen in some time,” as the SU-24 appeared to be flying in a “simulated attack profile.”

The Russian overflights have caused panic over in Washington, with White House spokesman Josh Earnest calling the actions of the Russian pilots “provocative” and “inconsistent with professional norms of militaries.”

“I hear the Russians are up to their old tricks again in the EUCOM [US European Command] AOR [area of responsibility],” Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman Col. Steve Warren said during a briefing on Wednesday, adding that the US is “concerned with this behavior.”

“We have deep concerns about the unsafe and unprofessional Russian flight maneuvers. These actions have the potential to unnecessarily escalate tensions between countries, and could result in a miscalculation or accident that could cause serious injury or death,” the US European Command said in a statement.

In the meantime Adm. John Richardson, the chief of naval operations, thanked the US crew for keeping their cool during the stressful situation.

“Bravo Zulu to the crew of USS Donald Cook for their initiative and toughness in how they handled themselves during this incident,” the admiral said on Facebook.

Russia has yet to comment on the incidents but most likely the Russian air craft flew from the Kaliningrad region, bordering Poland. Kaliningrad is the headquarters of the Russian Baltic Fleet, which also includes the Chernyakhovsk, Donskoye, and Kaliningrad Chkalovsk air bases.

Description Credits: Russia Today

Video Credits: Defense Media Activity - Navy

F/A-18 Hornet low altitude flying over Northern California has been added as a related post - related requested by kulpims on that post.

When I was in grade school in the 80s, they came to our town and did a low altitude pass-over that covered most of the city. No jet escort, though.

>> ^Jinx:

Yeah ok, that was fairly close. I wonder how close you have to get before they start interfering with airflow etc.


At low altitude, wake turbulence is less of an issue than famous scenes from Top Gun would have you think. Also, the more dangerous form are the wingtip variety, which only really spring to life at angles behind the winds wings of the aircraft, not as much directly behind. Even so, he was bouncing about 6"-10". Air is a thick soup down on the deck, though, so lots of wiggle room for fixed wing, crotch rocket, jets

In 1986 the Concorde flew directly over my house in Abbotsford at low altitude. That will never happen again either.

"Brazil’s Adilson Kindlemann wanted to reassure his fans and supporters on Thursday that he was feeling fine and not seriously hurt after his MXS-R crashed at low altitude into the Swan River in Perth during a training session ahead of the weekend’s Red Bull Air Race World Championship.

Kindlemann also wanted to thank the emergency rescue crews that quickly helped him after his plane impacted the water with his wings level and tail first. Kindlemann, who was treated for a minor whiplash injury, said he hoped to be out of Royal Perth Hospital in time to watch Friday’s training sessions. He also said he appreciated the support from other Red Bull Air Race pilots."

link

Awesome animations. I'm a little concerned that they didn't show the fate of the manned portion of the craft. It looks like it lost control at a low altitude, never making it to space.

I think that rather than a demonstration of the low-altitude capabilities of the Harrier (we all know if can fly really low), I think this video is intended to demonstrate the specific gravity and volume of this Royal Marine's bollocks. And it does that. Rather well.

i think that was intentional as the pilot's reaction was really up to the difficult situation in which he found himself. most reserve chutes used this days have a gunpowder charge which shoots out the reserve parachute with high enough velocity and force to penetrate the fabric of the main canopy, should you find yourself in the situation where you get tangled up in the main parachute and can't throw away the reserve manually. when you find yourself in trouble at a very low altitude such as this, you usually have only seconds to react and then it's only experience and training that can save your life

...for a photo shoot?

...WHY??

So you could compare how similar it would look from other air crafts that have whizzed through New York City's Skyline at dangerously low altitudes?

Jesus what the hell were they thinking???

More on this from wiki.

The pilot Arthur "Bud" Holland (46) was a cowboy, who had often performed risky and flatly unsafe manouvers many times throughout his career. He had even attempted a similar high angle (> 60° angle) turn like this above his daughters softball game - spiralling downwards for some 1000 feet before he could regain control of the aircraft. He was never removed from flight duty for any of his infractions.

The habitual lack of enforcement of safety regulations combined with the distraction of a recent mass shooting at their airbase four days prior failed to prevent Holland from trying the spectacular 360° turn at such low altitude. None of the four aircrew survived the crash.

The incident is used widely to show the importance of adhereing to and enforcing safety regulations, as well as correct crew resource management.

The translation is off on quite a few points and if you ask me, it was done intentionally.

Chronologically:
- chemtrails sounds like they were dispersing some chemical/biological agents while the original said "Düppel" aka chaffs. Chaffs and flares were dropped in vast amounts during the war and during excercises over the last 60 years, but noone ever bothered calling it pollution.
- they are not manipulating the climate, they are manipulating weather maps. No matter how many chaffs you drop, it's not going to change the bloody weather, it's only screwing up radar imagery.
- sinister clouds ... they are only sinister, because it's made by a German equivalent of Fox News
- excercise was in the airspace of the Netherlands, not on the German side of the border
- not "chemtrails comprised by fine dust containing polymers and metals", but chaffs that are basically small pieces of polymer coated with metal
- not chemtrails at low altitudes, but a low amount of chaffs
- protests against the use of chaffs and no, "people" are not mobilizing ... this is the bloody first time i ever heard someone complain
- new excercises, military says radar imagery might be somewhat compromised for three weeks --- "suspicious", "counterfit" ... my ass
- they estimate that the wind will blow the clouds over Westfalia, etc
- "weather manipulation" ... translated correctly, just pathetic journalism

I saw two of these at a low altitude on a summer trip in Alaska. I assume they were taking off from Eielson AFB heading to provide aid for the Russian/Georgian conflict that was occurring at the time.

Unfortunately my pictures I took of them don't really give the viewer the sense of the size of them.

You are correct it is still in service. Although technically the A-10 was scheduled to be retired in 2002. But seeing as the US military still needed a low altitude air to ground vehicle they canceled the retirement and extended the service of the A-10 until 2028. If that holds true the A-10 will see a longer strech of military service then any other warplane in history. 52 years (1976-2028).

In reply to this comment by james_austintx:
"WAS"? It's still in use....

In reply to this comment by gorgonheap:
the A-10 was a freaking sweet piece of military equipment