RAF Manston History Museum - Open cockpit Day April 16, 2023

 

..another gorgeous sunny day and a brilliant turnout as visitors flocked (yes, flocked!) to clamber on over, in and through some of the neat airframes exhibited at the RAF History Museum at Manston, Kent, England on one of the museum's regular open cockpit days. Where else in the UK can you sit in a Lightning, Buccaneer, Canberra and Victor, to name just four types? And everything in the Buccaneer works too. Heck, even the Auster is fun - pedals and stick work just as they should !  Thanks to 'johnboygtv' for the great drone shots of the museum. Not often you get to see a Lightning from this angle. 

Are the Russians using their so-called 5th Gen Su-57 (Frelon) in the Ukraine war ? latest UK MoD defence Intelligence report

According to the UK MoD Russia has been flying its new Su-57 jets against, but not over, Ukraine. According to the latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine the Russians have almost certainly used Su-57 FELON to conduct missions against Ukraine. To quote the UK Defence journal web site, 

"The Su-57 is equipped with advanced avionics and a range of modern weapons, including long-range air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. It is also designed to have stealth capabilities, which makes it difficult to detect on radar. The missions have likely been limited to flying over Russian territory, launching long range air-to-surface or air-to-air missiles into Ukraine..."

“Since at least June 2022, Russian Aerospace Forces have almost certainly used Su-57 FELON to conduct missions against Ukraine. FELON is Russia’s most advanced fifth-generation supersonic combat jet, employing stealth technologies and highly advanced avionics. These missions have likely been limited to flying over Russian territory, launching long range air-to-surface or air-to-air missiles into Ukraine.

Recent commercially available imagery shows five FELON parked at Akhtubinsk Air Base, which hosts the 929th Flight Test Centre. As this is the only known FELON base, these aircraft have likely been involved in operations against Ukraine.

Russia is highly likely prioritising avoiding the reputational damage, reduced export prospects, and the compromise of sensitive technology which would come from any loss of FELON over Ukraine. This is symptomatic of Russia’s continued risk-averse approach to employing its air force in the war.”

".. The SU-57 does look very cool, but looking cool isn’t the same as being effective...Using this aircraft in effect as a bomb truck does not make any real sense outside of the political and military sales arenas. I also wonder if the real reason is for such a low level of particiation by the Russian air force is more fundemental and deep seated than the quoted reason of not wanting to risk compromising their latest tech.

It has been discussed in the past that the Russians may lack the skills and comprehensive support structure necessary to mount large coordinated air operations. Most of their operations over Syria were reportedly small scale, rarely if ever more than 3 or 4 aircraft over the target area. This could well point to a lack of training for large scale coordinated operations involving dozens of aircraft of different types each conducting different roles within the mission profile, e.g surpression of enemy air defences, re-fueling, airborne command and control, escort and finally attack… All of this is required if you are operating in a contested environment and thanks to the Russians own lack of aggression against the Ukrainian air defences I suspect the the latter have only improved since the start of the war.

'Stealth' probably isn’t really the right word to describe the Su 57 -  low observable (L/O) is the better description so it is likely that the SU-57 would be vulnerable to the Ukrainian air defences if the type did venture into Ukrainian airspace. ."