Operation Snowfox PReEmptive Strike 011721

[Bones]

In the spirit of the 31st anniversary of Desert Storm, Mason and I flew a mission on the server where, must like in that first night of Jan 17, 1991, we were tasked to take out SAMs. In this case Hawks.

I took a loadout of 4 HARMs, 2 of which I planned to prebrief with coordinates from the intel report. I had AMRAAMs and Sidewinders as well.

Mason took an F-16 with HARMs and some AA missiles as well.

On our first sortie we flew out to the target area and I was able to get a HARM shot off but it was admittedly too early--I wanted to get closer but instead of the 30 miles I wanted to shoot at I had to shoot at 50+ because we got jumped by Fulcrums.

Mason was able to kill at least 1 Fulcrum but we both got hit. I don't think my HARM made it to its target.

Sortie 2

We formed up this time Mason had a full AA loadout and I had the same HARM loadout. We were able to get close enough for me to fire 2 HARMs--1 PB and one in SP mode at an Sa-2 that tried to shoot at me. We both dodged their missiles just fine, although at one point I rushed to the ground so fast I bottomed out at 300 ft barely alive. I fired my remaning HARMs to dump them as a single group of MiG-29s were trying to bounce us.

I think this is the first time I had a truly successful TWS/ripple fire kill. I was able to get 2 of the Fulcrums in my TWS and launch 2 AMRAAMs at them, ripple fired, at each one and each bandit was killed. I fired on the 3rd one as well, but he got me first. Meanwhile Mason was able to down 1 Fulcrum but got killed by a Fulcrum. Turns out we were actually engaging a 4 ship, of which we got at least 3.

Overall we were pleased with the mission and how we worked together as a package. It would have been nice to survive, but we did everything quite well and with coordination. SA was pretty good.

BTW, for tonight, we may be at night as when MAson and I left the server the sun was setting.



v6,
boNes