 |
VOOZH | about |
|
VOOZH | about |
In this article:
The F-104 Starfighter was one of the most fascinating aircraft of the Cold War era in Europe. Several European air forces operated the aircraft, with Germany alone having 916 Starfighters in its inventory and served both with the Luftwaffe and Marineflieger combat wings.
The two Naval Air Wings Marineflegergeschwader (MFG) 1 at Schleswig-Jagel and MFG 2 at Eggebek, both in Schleswig-Holstein, began converting to the Starfighter MFG 1 in autumn 1963 and MFG 2 in spring 1965. The Marineflieger Command had recommended the British Blackburn Buccaneer, a heavy fighter-bomber in service with the Royal Navy, as a replacement for the Sea Hawk reconnaissance and fighter-bomber aircraft that was flown up to then. However, for financial reasons, this special path could not be followed by the naval aviators. It was only possible to achieve simpler, better and more cost-effective logistics, infrastructure, training and personnel arrangements through the procurement of a very large number of F-104 aircraft.
As told by Klaus Kropf in his book German Starfighters, The Story in colour: Introduction and Units, the naval aviators’ area of operation was the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, and operations against sea targets in these areas were their main task. The pilots accepted the F-104G with pleasure. It was very stable in low-level flight over the sea, had excellent acceleration and a small radar cross section. The engine was very reliable and well able to cope with the conditions of flight over sea. The armament initially consisted of the onboard gun, ballistic high-explosive bombs and unguided rockets. In the 1970s, these were supplemented by cluster bombs, AS 30 air-to-ship guided missiles and the air-to-ship ‘fire and forget’ homing missile, Kormoran 1. AIM 9B air-to-air missiles were also available to engage aerial targets.
The 27 RF-104G reconnaissance aircraft used by the 1. Staffel/ MFG 2 were like the RF-104Gs of the Luftwaffe, equipped with the TA-7M camera system of the Dutch manufacturer De Oude Delft. The naval aviators also suffered the shortcomings of this system until an improved reconnaissance system was installed from December 1978 onwards.
On 23-24 June 1979, the International Air Tattoo, a huge air show, took place at the US air base Greenham Common, UK. One month earlier, the first MFG 2 Starfighter duo had been formed on the occasion of an open day at Eggebek. However bad weather at Eggebek prevented the team from taking off, so the successful demonstration a few weeks later at Greenham Common was its premiere. The pilots were Korvettenkapitän Jürgen Tank (Leader) and his Number Two, Kapitänleutnant Karsten Wichert. After the fatal crash of Kapitänleutnant Manfred Stürmer of MFG 1 during an air display at Royal Naval Air Station (RNAS) Yeovilton, UK, a few weeks later on 3 August 1979, the Starfighter duo project, the forerunner of the later Vikings, was abandoned until 1983.
The German Navy demonstration team “Vikings” performed its first display on 14 August, 1983 flying two F-104G Starfighters painted in standard Germany Navy colors grey and light grey. Both pilots and planes were from MFG 2 based in Eggebeck. The Vikings Vikings originally performed an eight minute routine but extended it to twelve minutes. The team was so successful that in the 1984 season a second identical team was formed. Now The Vikings could perform in two places at the same time.
The highlight of the team’s history was the North American tour in August 1986, when they performed in the USA and Canada.
After the Vikings returning from America, the team planes were painted in a special white, blue and red color scheme representing the colors of the state of Schleswig-Holstein where Eggebeck is located. However, just after five demonstrations with this paint scheme, on 27 September 1986, they performed for the last time. The reason was retirement of F-104.
Over the three shorts years of performing some 6 million spectators were able to enjoy more than 60 displays worldwide.
MFG 1 already converted to the Tornado in 1981 becoming the first German Armed Forces wing to operate the Tonka. MFG 2, on the other hand, continued to fly the Starfighter with the black anchor on the fuselage for several years. It was not until May 1987 that the last Marine Starfighter flight took place during a large farewell event at Erding.
The following video gives a highlight of the unique routine flown by Vikings’ F-104 Starfighters.
German Starfighters, The Story in colour: Introduction and Units is published by Key Publishing and is available to order here.
Photo credit: Anidaat Own Work, and Aeroprints.com via Wikipedia
Dario Leone: All articles
