A-10 Warthog To Participate In 2017 Heritage Flights

posted in: Airshows, Military | 3

A-10 Warthog Strafing Run - Hawgsmoke 2016 - Davis-Monthan AFB

Big news for all A-10 Warthog fans! Air Combat Command has announced that the A-10, officially known as the Thunderbolt II, will participate in US Air Force Heritage Flights during the 2017 season. It will not perform any aerobatic demonstrations, but may be able to perform a three pass “mini-demo” at each of the expected 20 show sites. The move will allow the Air Force to reach smaller airshows that cannot support the faster jet aircraft.

This is welcome news for fans of the popular A-10, who are eager to see the legendary “tank buster” aircraft at airshows. Two demonstration teams performed in the aircraft until 2012, when they flew only Heritage Flights. They have not performed since the 2013 sequestration budget cuts, and the Air Force even pushed to retire the entire A-10 fleet from service to meet its budget obligations.

There is hope for the future, however, as the F-16 Fighting Falcon “Viper East” team was also restarted by first performing only Heritage Flights. We could very well see Hogs soaring above in the coming years!

3 Responses

  1. Gary Rowe

    I would love to see the A-10 at the EAA airshow at Oshkosh ,WI this coming July.

    • Andrew

      I was thinking the same thing. They had them there last year, but didn’t fly in the shows. Would love to see a good Hog demo again. Hopefully now that we have a pro military president again, some more funds will be released to them.

  2. Duane Cooley

    Yhat funding issue had nothing to do with President Obama but Republicans in Congress forcing sequestraion. Congressional not Presidential.

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