206-803: The Mikoyan MiG-29 ( Russian : Микоян МиГ-29 ; NATO reporting name : Fulcrum ) is a twin-engine fighter aircraft designed in the Soviet Union . Developed by the Mikoyan design bureau as an air superiority fighter during the 1970s, the MiG-29, along with the larger Sukhoi Su-27 , was developed to counter U.S. fighters such as the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle and the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon . The MiG-29 entered service with
412-631: A Phazotron RLPK-29 radar fire control system which includes the N019 Sapfir 29 look-down/shoot-down coherent pulse-Doppler radar and the Ts100.02-02 digital computer. The N019 radar was not a new design, but rather a development of the Sapfir-23ML architecture used on the MiG-23ML. During the initial design specification period in the mid-1970s, Phazotron NIIR was tasked with producing
618-674: A constitutional referendum on whether to adopt Russian as a second official language. According to the Central Election Commission, 74.8% voted against, 24.9% voted for and the voter turnout was 71.1%. Starting in 2019, instruction in Russian will be gradually discontinued in private colleges and universities in Latvia, and in general instruction in Latvian public high schools. On 29 September 2022, Saeima passed in
824-519: A new education law which requires all schools to teach at least partially in Ukrainian, with provisions while allow indigenous languages and languages of national minorities to be used alongside the national language. The law faced criticism from officials in Russia and Hungary. The 2019 Law of Ukraine "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language" gives priority to
1030-408: A probe-and-drogue system . The cockpit features a conventional centre stick and left hand throttle controls. The pilot sits in a Zvezda K-36DM ejection seat . The cockpit has conventional dials, with a head-up display (HUD) and a Shchel-3UM helmet mounted display , but no HOTAS ("hands-on-throttle-and-stick") capability. Emphasis seems to have been placed on making the cockpit similar to
1236-434: A side-mounted control stick to ease control while maneuvering, an ejection seat reclined 30 degrees from vertical to reduce the effect of g-forces on the pilot, and the first use of a relaxed static stability / fly-by-wire flight control system that helps to make it an agile aircraft. The fighter has a single turbofan engine, an internal M61 Vulcan cannon and 11 hardpoints . Although officially named "Fighting Falcon",
1442-557: A 30% greater air-to-air detection range and a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) mode for high-resolution mapping and target detection-recognition. In August 2004, Northrop Grumman was contracted to upgrade the APG-68 radars of Block 40/42/50/52 aircraft to the (V)10 standard, providing all-weather autonomous detection and targeting for Global Positioning System (GPS)-aided precision weapons, SAR mapping, and terrain-following radar (TF) modes, as well as interleaving of all modes. The F-16E/F
1648-402: A NACA 64A-204 airfoil was selected; the camber is adjusted by leading-edge and trailing edge flaperons linked to a digital flight control system regulating the flight envelope . The F-16 has a moderate wing loading, reduced by fuselage lift. The vortex lift effect is increased by leading-edge extensions, known as strakes. Strakes act as additional short-span, triangular wings running from
1854-535: A Phazotron Zhuk-M radar. The aircraft is also being equipped to enhance beyond-visual-range combat ability and for air-to-air refuelling to increase endurance. In 2007, Russia also gave India's Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) a licence to manufacture 120 RD-33 series 3 turbofan engines for the upgrade. The upgrade will also include a new weapon control system, improved cockpit ergonomics , air-to-air missiles, high-accuracy air-to-ground missiles and guided bombs. The first six MiG-29s will be upgraded in Russia while
2060-766: A Russian MiG-29 shot it down using a R-27T missile. Russia denied these allegations. During the first half of September 2017, the Russian Aerospace Forces deployed some MiG-29SMT multirole combat aircraft to Khmeimim Airbase, near Latakia, in western Syria, becoming the first time the modernized version of the baseline Fulcrum jet was deployed to take part in the Syrian Air War. The MiG-29SMT were involved in bombing missions and secondary strategic bombers escort duties. Two Russian MiG-29s operated by Wagner Group crashed near Sirte , Libya on 28 June 2020 and on 7 September 2020. In April 2014, during
2266-521: A competitor to Northrop Grumman's AN/APG-68 and AN/APG-80 for the F-16. On 28 February 2020, Northrop Grumman received an order from USAF to extend the service lives of their F-16s to at least 2048 with AN/APG-83 as part of the service-life extension program (SLEP). The initial powerplant selected for the single-engined F-16 was the Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-200 afterburning turbofan , a modified version of
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#17327827427352472-460: A deal totaling $ 4.5 billion . F-16s were also used in their ground-attack role for strikes against targets in Lebanon. IAF F-16s participated in the 2006 Lebanon War and the 2008–09 Gaza War . During and after the 2006 Lebanon war, IAF F-16s shot down Iranian -made UAVs launched by Hezbollah , using Rafael Python 5 air-to-air missiles. On 10 February 2018, an Israeli Air Force F-16I
2678-518: A disclosure in Parliament, Defence Minister A. K. Antony said the MiG-29 is structurally flawed in that it has a tendency to develop cracks due to corrosion in the tail fin. Russia has shared this finding with India, which emerged after the crash of a Russian Air Force MiG-29 in December 2008. "A repair scheme and preventive measures are in place and IAF has not encountered major problems concerning
2884-633: A fixed-price upgrade package for foreign users. CAPES was not included in the Pentagon's 2015 budget request. The USAF said that the upgrade package will still be offered to Taiwan's Republic of China Air Force , and Lockheed said that some common elements with the F-35 will keep the radar's unit costs down. In 2014, the USAF issued a RFI to SLEP 300 F-16 C/Ds. To make more room for assembly of its newer F-35 Lightning II fighter aircraft, Lockheed Martin moved
3090-544: A formula with V standing for the nucleus (vowel) and C for each consonant, the maximal structure can be described as follows: (C)(C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C) General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon The General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon is an American single-engine supersonic multirole fighter aircraft originally developed by General Dynamics for the United States Air Force (USAF). Designed as an air superiority day fighter , it evolved into
3296-497: A general resistance to spins. The airframe consists primarily of aluminum with some composite materials, and is stressed for up to 9 g (88 m/s²) maneuvers. The controls have "soft" limiters to prevent the pilot from exceeding g and alpha limits, but the limiters can be disabled manually. The MiG-29 has two widely spaced Klimov RD-33 turbofan engines, each rated at 50 kilonewtons (11,200 lbf) dry and 81.3 kilonewtons (18,300 lbf) in afterburner . The space between
3502-403: A high AOA inducing a stall. The limiters also prevent maneuvers that would exert more than a 9- g load. Flight testing revealed that "assaulting" multiple limiters at high AOA and low speed can result in an AOA far exceeding the 25° limit, colloquially referred to as "departing"; this causes a deep stall; a near-freefall at 50° to 60° AOA, either upright or inverted. While at a very high AOA,
3708-529: A high-PRF pulse-Doppler track mode to provide Interrupted Continuous Wave guidance for semi-active radar homing (SARH) missiles like the AIM-7 Sparrow. Block 50/52 F-16s initially used the more reliable APG-68(V)5 which has a programmable signal processor employing Very High Speed Integrated Circuit (VHSIC) technology. The Advanced Block 50/52 (or 50+/52+) is equipped with the APG-68(V)9 radar, with
3914-416: A high-speed taxi test on 20 January 1974. While gathering speed, a roll-control oscillation caused a fin of the port-side wingtip-mounted missile and then the starboard stabilator to scrape the ground, and the aircraft then began to veer off the runway. The test pilot, Phil Oestricher , decided to lift off to avoid a potential crash, safely landing six minutes later. The slight damage was quickly repaired and
4120-484: A language that "belongs to the European cultural space". The financing of Russian-language content by the state will cease, which the concept says create a "unified information space". However, one inevitable consequence would be the closure of public media broadcasts in Russian on LTV and Latvian Radio, as well as the closure of LSM's Russian-language service. In Lithuania , Russian has no official or legal status, but
4326-588: A lesser extent the languages to the south and the east: Uralic , Turkic , Persian , Arabic , and Hebrew . According to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California , Russian is classified as a level III language in terms of learning difficulty for native English speakers, requiring approximately 1,100 hours of immersion instruction to achieve intermediate fluency. Feudal divisions and conflicts created obstacles between
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#17327827427354532-551: A lot was made about the MiG-29 issue several months ago, not very much has been noticed about the sheer amount of spare parts and other things that we've done to help them actually put more of their own MiG-29s in the air and keep those that are in the air flying for a longer period of time. And then also, in recent PDA [Presidential Drawdown Authority] packages we've included a number of anti-radiation missiles that can be fired off of Ukrainian aircraft. They can have effects on Russian radars and other things." Soviet era aircraft don't have
4738-401: A low altitude fly by. In the evening of 7 August 2014, a Ukrainian Air Force MiG-29MU1, bort number 02 Blue, was shot down by an antiaircraft missile fired by pro-Russian rebels near the town of Yenakievo, and exploded in midair. The pilot ejected safely. On 17 August 2014, another Ukrainian Air Force MiG-29, bort number 53 White, tasked with air to ground duties against separatists' positions
4944-549: A maximum thrust of 32,500 lbf (145 kN), the highest thrust engine developed for the F-16. The F-16 is being used by the active-duty USAF, Air Force Reserve , and Air National Guard units, the USAF aerial demonstration team, the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds , and as an adversary-aggressor aircraft by the United States Navy at the Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center . The U.S. Air Force, including
5150-432: A medium PRF for heavy clutter environments. It has four operating frequencies within the X band, and provides four air-to-air and seven air-to-ground operating modes for combat, even at night or in bad weather. The Block 15's APG-66(V)2 model added more powerful signal processing , higher output power, improved reliability, and increased range in cluttered or jamming environments. The Mid-Life Update (MLU) program introduced
5356-622: A minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . 30% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 2% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Azerbaijan , Russian has no official status, but is a lingua franca of the country. 26% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 5% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Georgia , Russian has no official status, but it
5562-494: A modern radar for the MiG-29. To speed development, Phazotron based its new design on work undertaken by NPO Istok on the experimental " Soyuz " radar program. Accordingly, the N019 was originally intended to have a flat planar array antenna and full digital signal processing , for a detection and tracking range of at least 100 km (62 mi) against a fighter-sized target. Prototype testing revealed this could not be attained in
5768-736: A new model, APG-66(V)2A, which features higher speed and more memory. The AN/APG-68 , an evolution of the APG-66, was introduced with the F-16C/D Block 25. The APG-68 has greater range and resolution, as well as 25 operating modes, including ground-mapping, Doppler beam-sharpening, ground moving target indication , sea target, and track while scan (TWS) for up to 10 targets. The Block 40/42's APG-68(V)1 model added full compatibility with Lockheed Martin Low Altitude Navigation and Targeting Infrared for Night (LANTIRN) pods, and
5974-562: A production line for the KF-16 program, producing 140 Block 52s from the mid-1990s to mid-2000s (decade). If India had selected the F-16IN for its Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft procurement, a sixth F-16 production line would have been built in India. In May 2013, Lockheed Martin stated there were currently enough orders to keep producing the F-16 until 2017. One change made during production
6180-526: A qualitatively new entity can be said to emerge—the general language of the working class... capitalism has the tendency of creating the general urban language of a given society. In 2010, there were 259.8 million speakers of Russian in the world: in Russia – 137.5 million, in the CIS and Baltic countries – 93.7 million, in Eastern Europe – 12.9 million, Western Europe – 7.3 million, Asia – 2.7 million, in
6386-525: A second crash with a MiG-29 in east Siberia in December 2008, Russian officials admitted that most MiG-29 fighters in the Russian Air Force were incapable of performing combat duties due to poor maintenance. The age of the aircraft was also an important factor as about 70% of the MiGs were considered to be too old to take to the skies. The Russian MiG-29s have not received updates since the collapse of
Mikoyan MiG-29 - Misplaced Pages Continue
6592-556: A single GSh-30-1 30 mm (1.18 in) cannon in the port wing root. This originally had a 150-round magazine, which was reduced to 100 rounds in later variants, which only allows a few seconds of firing before running out of ammo. Original production MiG-29 aircraft cannot fire the cannon when carrying a centerline fuel tank as it blocks the shell ejection port. This was corrected in the MiG-29S and later versions. Three pylons are provided under each wing (four in some variants), for
6798-571: A single digital display. In 2013, sequestration budget cuts cast doubt on the USAF's ability to complete the Combat Avionics Programmed Extension Suite (CAPES), a part of secondary programs such as Taiwan's F-16 upgrade. Air Combat Command 's General Mike Hostage stated that if he only had money for a service life extension program (SLEP) or CAPES, he would fund SLEP to keep the aircraft flying. Lockheed Martin responded to talk of CAPES cancellation with
7004-583: A successful all-weather multirole aircraft with over 4,600 built since 1976. Although no longer purchased by the U.S. Air Force, improved versions are being built for export. In 1993, General Dynamics sold its aircraft manufacturing business to the Lockheed Corporation , which became part of Lockheed Martin after a 1995 merger with Martin Marietta . The F-16's key features include a frameless bubble canopy for enhanced cockpit visibility,
7210-435: A total of six (or eight). The inboard pylons can carry either a 1,150 L (250 imp gal; 300 US gal) fuel tank, one Vympel R-27 (AA-10 "Alamo") medium-range air-to-air missile, or unguided bombs or rockets. Some Soviet aircraft could carry a single nuclear bomb on the port inboard station. The outer pylons usually carry R-73 (AA-11 "Archer") dogfight air to air missiles, although some users still retain
7416-419: A true appreciation of its capabilities. Early MiG-29s were very agile aircraft, capable of rivaling the performance of contemporary F-18 and F-16 aircraft. However, their relatively low fuel capacity relegated them to short-range air defense missions. Lacking HOTAS and an inter-aircraft data link, and requiring a very intensive "heads-down" approach to operating cockpit controls, the early MiG-29 denied pilots
7622-457: A way as to produce the desired result without inducing control loss. The FLCC conducts thousands of measurements per second on the aircraft's flight attitude to automatically counter deviations from the pilot-set flight path. The FLCC further incorporates limiters governing movement in the three main axes based on attitude, airspeed, and angle of attack (AOA)/ g ; these prevent control surfaces from inducing instability such as slips or skids , or
7828-409: A weapon that relies on digital display to fire, the question of how it has been integrated into the MiG-29's analogue displays remains unanswered. The footage shows a commercial GPS having been installed along with a tablet of some kind. On 13 October 2022, a Ukrainian MiG-29 crashed during a combat mission. Its pilot is claimed to have destroyed a Shahed-136 drone with his cannon, and it is believed
8034-484: A weapons mix. More recent versions support the AIM-120 AMRAAM , and US aircraft often mount that missile on their wingtips to reduce wing flutter . The aircraft can carry various other AAMs, a wide variety of air-to-ground missiles, rockets or bombs; electronic countermeasures (ECM), navigation, targeting or weapons pods ; and fuel tanks on 9 hardpoints – six under the wings, two on wingtips, and one under
8240-539: Is Belarusian, among ethnic Belarusians this share is 28.5%; the highest share of those who speak Belarusian at home is among ethnic Poles — 46.0%. In Estonia , Russian is spoken by 29.6% of the population, according to a 2011 estimate from the World Factbook, and is officially considered a foreign language. School education in the Russian language is a very contentious point in Estonian politics, and in 2022,
8446-481: Is a co-official language per article 5 of the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan . The 2009 census states that 482,200 people speak Russian as a native language, or 8.99% of the population. Additionally, 1,854,700 residents of Kyrgyzstan aged 15 and above fluently speak Russian as a second language, or 49.6% of the population in the age group. In Tajikistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication under
Mikoyan MiG-29 - Misplaced Pages Continue
8652-401: Is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian , and a moderate degree of it in all modern Slavic languages, at least at the conversational level. Russian is written using a Cyrillic alphabet. The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. The following table gives their forms, along with IPA values for each letter's typical sound: Older letters of
8858-610: Is a post-posed definite article -to , -ta , -te similar to that existing in Bulgarian and Macedonian. In the Southern Russian dialects , instances of unstressed /e/ and /a/ following palatalized consonants and preceding a stressed syllable are not reduced to [ɪ] (as occurs in the Moscow dialect), being instead pronounced [a] in such positions (e.g. несл и is pronounced [nʲaˈslʲi] , not [nʲɪsˈlʲi] ) – this
9064-466: Is an obstruction to a pilot's forward vision. The F-16's ACES II zero/zero ejection seat is reclined at an unusual tilt-back angle of 30°; most fighters have a tilted seat at 13–15°. The tilted seat can accommodate taller pilots and increases g -force tolerance; however, it has been associated with reports of neck aches, possibly caused by incorrect headrest usage. Subsequent U.S. fighters have adopted more modest tilt-back angles of 20°. Because of
9270-488: Is being used less frequently by Russian-speaking typists in favor of the extension of Unicode character encoding , which fully incorporates the Russian alphabet. Free programs are available offering this Unicode extension, which allow users to type Russian characters, even on Western 'QWERTY' keyboards. The Russian language was first introduced to computing after the M-1 , and MESM models were produced in 1951. According to
9476-460: Is built with about 80% aviation-grade aluminum alloys , 8% steel, 3% composites, and 1.5% titanium . The leading-edge flaps, stabilators, and ventral fins make use of bonded aluminum honeycomb structures and graphite epoxy lamination coatings . The number of lubrication points, fuel line connections, and replaceable modules is significantly less than in preceding fighters; 80% of the access panels can be accessed without stands. The air intake
9682-624: Is called yakanye ( яканье ). Consonants include a fricative /ɣ/ , a semivowel /w⁓u̯/ and /x⁓xv⁓xw/ , whereas the Standard and Northern dialects have the consonants /ɡ/ , /v/ , and final /l/ and /f/ , respectively. The morphology features a palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs (this is unpalatalized in the Standard and Northern dialects). During the Proto-Slavic (Common Slavic) times all Slavs spoke one mutually intelligible language or group of dialects. There
9888-470: Is expected to gradually begin replacing several multirole aircraft among the program's member nations. However, owing to delays in the F-35 program, all USAF F-16s will receive service life extension upgrades. In 2022, it was announced the USAF would continue to operate the F-16 for another two decades. The F-16's first air-to-air combat success was achieved by the Israeli Air Force (IAF) over
10094-573: Is more spoken than English. Sizable Russian-speaking communities also exist in North America, especially in large urban centers of the US and Canada, such as New York City , Philadelphia , Boston , Los Angeles , Nashville , San Francisco , Seattle , Spokane , Toronto , Calgary , Baltimore , Miami , Portland , Chicago , Denver , and Cleveland . In a number of locations they issue their own newspapers, and live in ethnic enclaves (especially
10300-564: Is odd") – чу́дно ( chúdno – "this is marvellous"), молоде́ц ( molodéts – "well done!") – мо́лодец ( mólodets – "fine young man"), узна́ю ( uznáyu – "I shall learn it") – узнаю́ ( uznayú – "I recognize it"), отреза́ть ( otrezát – "to be cutting") – отре́зать ( otrézat – "to have cut"); to indicate the proper pronunciation of uncommon words, especially personal and family names, like афе́ра ( aféra , "scandal, affair"), гу́ру ( gúru , "guru"), Гарси́я ( García ), Оле́ша ( Olésha ), Фе́рми ( Fermi ), and to show which
10506-531: Is outfitted with Northrop Grumman's AN/APG-80 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. Northrop Grumman developed the latest AESA radar upgrade for the F-16 (selected for USAF and Taiwan's Republic of China Air Force F-16 upgrades), named the AN/APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR). In July 2007, Raytheon announced that it was developing a Next Generation Radar (RANGR) based on its earlier AN/APG-79 AESA radar as
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#173278274273510712-402: Is recognized as a minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . Russian is the language of 9% of the population according to the World Factbook. Ethnologue cites Russian as the country's de facto working language. In China , Russian has no official status, but it is spoken by the small Russian communities in the northeastern Heilongjiang and
10918-569: Is sometimes considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. Also, Russian has notable lexical similarities with Bulgarian due to a common Church Slavonic influence on both languages, but because of later interaction in the 19th and 20th centuries, Bulgarian grammar differs markedly from Russian. Over the course of centuries, the vocabulary and literary style of Russian have also been influenced by Western and Central European languages such as Greek, Latin , Polish , Dutch , German, French, Italian, and English, and to
11124-585: Is spoken by 14.2% of the population according to an undated estimate from the World Factbook. In 2005, Russian was the most widely taught foreign language in Mongolia, and was compulsory in Year 7 onward as a second foreign language in 2006. Around 1.5 million Israelis spoke Russian as of 2017. The Israeli press and websites regularly publish material in Russian and there are Russian newspapers, television stations, schools, and social media outlets based in
11330-518: Is the stressed word in a sentence, for example Ты́ съел печенье? ( Tý syel pechenye? – "Was it you who ate the cookie?") – Ты съе́л печенье? ( Ty syél pechenye? – "Did you eat the cookie?) – Ты съел пече́нье? ( Ty syel pechénye? "Was it the cookie you ate?"). Stress marks are mandatory in lexical dictionaries and books for children or Russian learners. The Russian syllable structure can be quite complex, with both initial and final consonant clusters of up to four consecutive sounds. Using
11536-636: The 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks , but Flight 93 was prematurely brought down by the hijackers after passengers attacked the cockpit, so the F-16s were retasked to patrol the local airspace and later escorted Air Force One back to Washington. The F-16 had been scheduled to remain in service with the U.S. Air Force until 2025. Its replacement is planned to be the F-35A variant of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II , which
11742-470: The 2011 Lithuanian census , Russian was the native language for 7.2% of the population. In Moldova , Russian was considered to be the language of interethnic communication under a Soviet-era law. On 21 January 2021, the Constitutional Court of Moldova declared the law unconstitutional and deprived Russian of the status of the language of interethnic communication. 50% of the population
11948-627: The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine , Su-27s and MiG-29s were used as air superiority fighters, with ten MiG-29s reported lost on the ground and in the air. In August 2022, a senior U.S. defense official disclosed that the Ukrainians have integrated the AGM-88 HARM missile onto their "MiG aircraft" with video evidence of AGM-88 missiles fired by upgraded Ukrainian MiG-29s released by the Ukrainian Air Force few days later. For
12154-534: The AIM-9X . The F-16A/B was originally equipped with the Westinghouse AN/APG-66 fire-control radar . Its slotted planar array antenna was designed to be compact to fit into the F-16's relatively small nose. In uplook mode, the APG-66 uses a low pulse-repetition frequency (PRF) for medium- and high-altitude target detection in a low- clutter environment, and in look-down/shoot-down employs
12360-1000: The Apollo–Soyuz mission, which first flew in 1975. In March 2013, Russian was found to be the second-most used language on websites after English. Russian was the language of 5.9% of all websites, slightly ahead of German and far behind English (54.7%). Russian was used not only on 89.8% of .ru sites, but also on 88.7% of sites with the former Soviet Union domain .su . Websites in former Soviet Union member states also used high levels of Russian: 79.0% in Ukraine, 86.9% in Belarus, 84.0% in Kazakhstan, 79.6% in Uzbekistan, 75.9% in Kyrgyzstan and 81.8% in Tajikistan. However, Russian
12566-473: The Bekaa Valley on 28 April 1981, against a Syrian Mi-8 helicopter, which was downed with cannon fire. On 7 June 1981, eight Israeli F-16s, escorted by six F-15s, executed Operation Opera , their first employment in a significant air-to-ground operation. This raid severely damaged Osirak , an Iraqi nuclear reactor under construction near Baghdad , to prevent the regime of Saddam Hussein from using
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#173278274273512772-712: The Cold War , a Soviet response was necessary to avoid the possibility of the Americans gaining a serious technological advantage over the Soviets, thus the development of a new air superiority fighter became a priority. In 1969, the Soviet General Staff issued a requirement for a Perspektivnyy Frontovoy Istrebitel ( PFI , roughly "Advanced Frontline Fighter"). Specifications were extremely ambitious, calling for long range, good short-field performance (including
12978-413: The Constitution of Tajikistan and is permitted in official documentation. 28% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 7% used it as the main language with family, friends or at work. The World Factbook notes that Russian is widely used in government and business. In Turkmenistan , Russian lost its status as the official lingua franca in 1996. Among 12% of the population who grew up in
13184-570: The Internet . Russian is written using the Russian alphabet of the Cyrillic script ; it distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without—the so-called "soft" and "hard" sounds. Almost every consonant has a hard or soft counterpart, and the distinction is a prominent feature of the language, which is usually shown in writing not by a change of
13390-676: The Royal Norwegian Air Force by Fokker and to the Royal Danish Air Force by SABCA. During the late 1980s and 1990s, Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) produced 232 Block 30/40/50 F-16s on a production line in Ankara under license for the Turkish Air Force . TAI also produced 46 Block 40s for Egypt in the mid-1990s and 30 Block 50s from 2010 onwards. Korean Aerospace Industries opened
13596-690: The Russian Federation , Belarus , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , and Tajikistan , and is still commonly used as a lingua franca in Ukraine , Moldova , the Caucasus , Central Asia , and to a lesser extent in the Baltic states and Israel . Russian has over 258 million total speakers worldwide. It is the most spoken native language in Europe , the most spoken Slavic language , as well as
13802-403: The Russian invasion of Crimea , 45 Ukrainian Air Force MiG-29s and 4 L-39 combat trainers were reportedly captured by Russian forces at Belbek air base . Most of the planes appeared to be in inoperable condition. In May, Russian troops dismantled them and shipped them back to Ukraine. On 4 August 2014, the Ukrainian government stated that a number of them had been put back into service to fight in
14008-421: The Soviet Air Forces in 1983. While originally oriented towards combat against any enemy aircraft, many MiG-29s have been furnished as multirole fighters capable of performing a number of different operations, and are commonly outfitted to use a range of air-to-surface armaments and precision munitions . The MiG-29 has been manufactured in several major variants, including the multirole Mikoyan MiG-29M and
14214-430: The Soviet Union , the militaries of multiple ex-Soviet republics have continued to operate the MiG-29, the largest of them being the Russian Aerospace Forces . The Russian Aerospace Forces wanted to upgrade its existing fleet to the modernised MiG-29SMT configuration, but financial difficulties have limited deliveries. The MiG-29 has also been a popular export aircraft; more than 30 nations either operate or have operated
14420-488: The Sukhoi Su-57 , but a different design was needed to replace the lighter MiGs. A previous attempt to develop a MiG-29 replacement, the MiG 1.44 demonstrator, failed in the 1990s. The concept came up again in 2001 with interest from India, but they later opted for a variant of the Su-57. Air Force commanders have hinted at the possibility of a single-engine airframe that uses the Su-57's engine, radar, and weapons primarily for Russian service. This has since been revealed to be
14626-402: The Sukhoi Su-75 Checkmate . Sharing its origins in the original PFI requirements issued by TsAGI , the MiG-29 has broad aerodynamic similarities to the Sukhoi Su-27 , but with some notable differences. The MiG-29 has a mid-mounted swept wing with blended leading-edge root extensions (LERXs) swept at around 40°; there are swept tailplanes and two vertical fins, mounted on booms outboard of
14832-584: The Ukrainian language in more than 30 spheres of public life: in particular in public administration , media, education, science, culture, advertising, services . The law does not regulate private communication. A poll conducted in March 2022 by RATING in the territory controlled by Ukraine found that 83% of the respondents believe that Ukrainian should be the only state language of Ukraine. This opinion dominates in all macro-regions, age and language groups. On
15038-721: The United States Census , in 2007 Russian was the primary language spoken in the homes of over 850,000 individuals living in the United States. Russian is one of the official languages (or has similar status and interpretation must be provided into Russian) of the following: The Russian language is also one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station – NASA astronauts who serve alongside Russian cosmonauts usually take Russian language courses. This practice goes back to
15244-564: The energy–maneuverability theory to model a fighter aircraft's performance in combat. Boyd's work called for a small, lightweight aircraft that could maneuver with the minimum possible energy loss and which also incorporated an increased thrust-to-weight ratio . In the late 1960s, Boyd gathered a group of like-minded innovators who became known as the Fighter Mafia , and in 1969, they secured Department of Defense funding for General Dynamics and Northrop to study design concepts based on
15450-780: The wing root (the junction with the fuselage) to a point further forward on the fuselage. Blended into the fuselage and along the wing root, the strake generates a high-speed vortex that remains attached to the top of the wing as the angle of attack increases, generating additional lift and allowing greater angles of attack without stalling. Strakes allow a smaller, lower- aspect-ratio wing, which increases roll rates and directional stability while decreasing weight. Deeper wing roots also increase structural strength and internal fuel volume. Early F-16s could be armed with up to six AIM-9 Sidewinder heat-seeking short-range air-to-air missiles (AAM) by employing rail launchers on each wingtip, as well as radar-guided AIM-7 Sparrow medium-range AAMs in
15656-415: The " vortex lift " phenomenon could be harnessed by highly swept wing configurations to reach higher angles of attack , using leading edge vortex flow off a slender lifting surface. As the F-16 was being optimized for high combat agility, GD's designers chose a slender cropped-delta wing with a leading-edge sweep of 40° and a straight trailing edge. To improve maneuverability, a variable-camber wing with
15862-510: The "-220" engines on Block 25 and later aircraft were upgraded from 1997 onwards to the "-220E" standard, which enhanced reliability and maintainability; unscheduled engine removals were reduced by 35%. The F100-PW-220/220E was the result of the USAF's Alternate Fighter Engine (AFE) program (colloquially known as "the Great Engine War"), which also saw the entry of General Electric as an F-16 engine provider. Its F110-GE-100 turbofan
16068-407: The 1980s, Mikoyan developed the improved MiG-29S to use longer range R-27E air-to-air missiles. It added a dorsal 'hump' to the upper fuselage to house a jamming system and some additional fuel capacity. The weapons load was increased to 4,000 kg (8,800 lb) with airframe strengthening. These features were included in new-built fighters and upgrades to older MiG-29s. Refined versions of
16274-519: The 20th century, Russian was a mandatory language taught in the schools of the members of the old Warsaw Pact and in other countries that used to be satellites of the USSR. According to the Eurobarometer 2005 survey, fluency in Russian remains fairly high (20–40%) in some countries, in particular former Warsaw Pact countries. In Armenia , Russian has no official status, but it is recognized as
16480-539: The 29,588 lbf (131.61 kN) F110-GE-129 on the Block 50 and 29,160 lbf (129.7 kN) F100-PW-229 on the Block 52. F-16s began flying with these IPE engines in the early 1990s. Altogether, of the 1,446 F-16C/Ds ordered by the USAF, 556 were fitted with F100-series engines and 890 with F110s. The United Arab Emirates' Block 60 is powered by the General Electric F110-GE-132 turbofan with
16686-981: The Air Force Reserve and the Air National Guard, flew the F-16 in combat during Operation Desert Storm in 1991 and in the Balkans later in the 1990s. F-16s also patrolled the no-fly zones in Iraq during Operations Northern Watch and Southern Watch and served during the War in Afghanistan and the War in Iraq from 2001 and 2003 respectively. In 2011, Air Force F-16s took part in the intervention in Libya . On 11 September 2001, two unarmed F-16s were launched in an attempt to ram and down United Airlines Flight 93 before it reached Washington D.C. during
16892-663: The Air Force and Navy, and in August 1974 redirected Navy funds to a new Navy Air Combat Fighter program that would be a naval fighter-bomber variant of the LWF. The four NATO allies had formed the Multinational Fighter Program Group (MFPG) and pressed for a U.S. decision by December 1974; thus, the USAF accelerated testing. To reflect this serious intent to procure a new fighter-bomber, the LWF program
17098-471: The Belarusian society the Russian language prevails, so according to the 2019 census 6,718,557 people (71.4% of the total population) stated that they speak Russian at home, for ethnic Belarusians this share is 61.4%, for Russians — 97.2%, for Ukrainians — 89.0%, for Poles — 52.4%, and for Jews — 96.6%; 2,447,764 people (26.0% of the total population) stated that the language they usually speak at home
17304-452: The F-15's F100-PW-100, rated at 23,830 lbf (106.0 kN) thrust. During testing, the engine was found to be prone to compressor stalls and "rollbacks", wherein the engine's thrust would spontaneously reduce to idle. Until resolved, the Air Force ordered F-16s to be operated within " dead-stick landing " distance of its bases. It was the standard F-16 engine through the Block 25, except for
17510-413: The F-16 gains positive stability because of aerodynamic changes. To counter the tendency to depart from controlled flight and avoid the need for constant trim inputs by the pilot, the F-16 has a quadruplex (four-channel) fly-by-wire (FBW) flight control system (FLCS). The flight control computer (FLCC) accepts pilot input from the stick and rudder controls and manipulates the control surfaces in such
17716-513: The F-16 in three stages. The MSIP process permitted the quick introduction of new capabilities, at lower costs and with reduced risks compared to traditional independent upgrade programs. In 2012, the USAF had allocated $ 2.8 billion (~$ 3.67 billion in 2023) to upgrade 350 F-16s while waiting for the F-35 to enter service. One key upgrade has been an auto-GCAS ( Ground collision avoidance system ) to reduce instances of controlled flight into terrain . Onboard power and cooling capacities limit
17922-614: The F-16 production from Fort Worth, Texas to its plant in Greenville, South Carolina . Lockheed delivered the last F-16 from Fort Worth to the Iraqi Air Force on 14 November 2017, ending 40 years of F-16 production there. The company resumed production in 2019, though engineering and modernization work will remain in Fort Worth. A gap in orders made it possible to stop production during the move; after completing orders for
18128-426: The F-16's cockpit is the exceptional field of view. The single-piece, bird-proof polycarbonate bubble canopy provides 360° all-round visibility, with a 40° look-down angle over the side of the aircraft, and 15° down over the nose (compared to the common 12–13° of preceding aircraft); the pilot's seat is elevated for this purpose. Additionally, the F-16's canopy omits the forward bow frame found on many fighters, which
18334-529: The F-16A/B had monochrome cathode-ray tube (CRT) displays; replaced by color liquid-crystal displays on the Block 50/52. The Mid-Life Update (MLU) introduced compatibility with night-vision goggles (NVG). The Boeing Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing System (JHMCS) is available from Block 40 onwards for targeting based on where the pilot's head faces, unrestricted by the HUD, using high- off-boresight missiles like
18540-454: The FSD aircraft demonstrated a real concern. In response, the area of each horizontal stabilizer was increased by 25% on the Block 15 aircraft in 1981 and later retrofitted to earlier aircraft. In addition, a manual override switch to disable the horizontal stabilizer flight limiter was prominently placed on the control console, allowing the pilot to regain control of the horizontal stabilizers (which
18746-748: The Fokker factory. Beginning in November 1977, Fokker-produced components were sent to Fort Worth for fuselage assembly, then shipped back to Europe for final assembly of EPAF aircraft at the Belgian plant on 15 February 1978; deliveries to the Belgian Air Force began in January 1979. The first Royal Netherlands Air Force aircraft was delivered in June 1979. In 1980, the first aircraft were delivered to
18952-532: The Great and developed from the Moscow ( Middle or Central Russian ) dialect substratum under the influence of some of the previous century's Russian chancery language. Prior to the Bolshevik Revolution , the spoken form of the Russian language was that of the nobility and the urban bourgeoisie. Russian peasants, the great majority of the population, continued to speak in their own dialects. However,
19158-655: The Indian Navy on 19 February 2010. Russian language Russian is an East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family . It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and is the native language of the Russians . It was the de facto and de jure official language of the former Soviet Union . Russian has remained an official language of
19364-590: The Institute of Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an optional acute accent ( знак ударения ) may, and sometimes should, be used to mark stress . For example, it is used to distinguish between otherwise identical words, especially when context does not make it obvious: замо́к ( zamók – "lock") – за́мок ( zámok – "castle"), сто́ящий ( stóyashchy – "worthwhile") – стоя́щий ( stoyáshchy – "standing"), чудно́ ( chudnó – "this
19570-538: The LWF into a serious acquisition program. NATO allies Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Norway were seeking to replace their F-104G Starfighter fighter-bombers . In early 1974, they reached an agreement with the U.S. that if the USAF ordered the LWF winner, they would consider ordering it as well. The USAF also needed to replace its F-105 Thunderchief and F-4 Phantom II fighter-bombers. The U.S. Congress sought greater commonality in fighter procurements by
19776-737: The MiG-29 with improved avionics were fielded by the Soviet Union, but Mikoyan's multirole variants, including a carrier-based version designated MiG-29K , were never produced in large numbers. Development of the MiG-29K carrier version was suspended for over a decade before being resumed; the type went into service with the Indian Navy 's INS Vikramaditya , and Russian Navy 's Admiral Kuznetsov class aircraft carrier . Mikoyan also developed improved versions MiG-29M and MiG-29SMT . There have been several upgrade programmes conducted for
19982-510: The MiG-29's ability to detect and track airborne targets at ranges available with the R-27 and R-77 missiles. The N019 was further compromised by Phazotron designer Adolf Tolkachev 's betrayal of the radar to the CIA , for which he was executed in 1986. In response to all of these problems, the Soviets hastily developed a modified N019M Topaz radar for the upgraded MiG-29S aircraft. However, VVS
20188-514: The MiG-29, outside of the Warsaw Pact . The Indian Air Force (IAF) placed an order for 44 aircraft (40 single-seat MiG-29 9.12Bs and four twin-seat MiG-29UBs) in 1984, and the MiG-29 was officially inducted into the IAF in 1987. In 1989, an additional 26 aircraft were ordered, and 10 more advanced MiG-29 9.13s were bought in 1994. Since then, the aircraft has undergone a series of modifications with
20394-406: The MiG-29. Common upgrades include the adoption of standard-compatible avionics, service life extensions to 4,000 flight hours, safety enhancements, greater combat capabilities and reliability. On 11 December 2013, Russian deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin revealed that Russia was planning to build a new fighter to replace the MiG-29. The Sukhoi Su-27 and its derivatives were to be replaced by
20600-621: The MiG-29s entered service with the newly formed Russian Air Force . In July 1993, two MiG-29s of the Russian Air Force collided in mid-air and crashed away from the public at the Royal International Air Tattoo . No one on the ground sustained any serious injuries, and the two pilots ejected and landed safely. The Russian Air Force grounded all its MiG-29s following a crash in Siberia on 17 October 2008. Following
20806-526: The Middle East and North Africa – 1.3 million, Sub-Saharan Africa – 0.1 million, Latin America – 0.2 million, U.S., Canada , Australia, and New Zealand – 4.1 million speakers. Therefore, the Russian language is the seventh-largest in the world by the number of speakers , after English, Mandarin, Hindi -Urdu, Spanish, French, Arabic, and Portuguese. Russian is one of the six official languages of
21012-471: The Netherlands, and 72 for Norway. Two European production lines, one in the Netherlands at Fokker 's Schiphol-Oost facility and the other at SABCA's Gosselies plant in Belgium, would produce 184 and 164 units respectively. Norway's Kongsberg Vaapenfabrikk and Denmark's Terma A/S also manufactured parts and subassemblies for EPAF aircraft. European co-production was officially launched on 1 July 1977 at
21218-442: The Russian Aerospace Forces that happened in 2015 were caused mostly by overall increase of flights and training. On 20 April 2008, Georgian officials claimed a Russian MiG-29 shot down a Georgian Hermes 450 unmanned aerial vehicle and provided video footage from the ill-fated drone showing an apparent MiG-29 launching an air-to-air missile at it. Russia denies that the aircraft was theirs and says they did not have any pilots in
21424-559: The Russian Aerospace Forces. Instead, the 35 MiG-29SMT/UBTs rejected by Algeria were bought by the Russian Aerospace Forces. Russia placed an order for 16 new-build MiG-29SMTs on 15 April 2014, with delivery expected by 2017. On 4 June 2015, a MiG-29 crashed during training in Astrakhan . A month later, another MiG-29 crashed near the village of Kushchevskaya in the Krasnodar region with the pilot safely ejecting. A series of accidents in
21630-807: The Russian alphabet include ⟨ ѣ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ е ⟩ ( /je/ or /ʲe/ ); ⟨ і ⟩ and ⟨ ѵ ⟩ , which both merged to ⟨ и ⟩ ( /i/ ); ⟨ ѳ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ф ⟩ ( /f/ ); ⟨ ѫ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ у ⟩ ( /u/ ); ⟨ ѭ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ю ⟩ ( /ju/ or /ʲu/ ); and ⟨ ѧ ⟩ and ⟨ ѩ ⟩ , which later were graphically reshaped into ⟨ я ⟩ and merged phonetically to /ja/ or /ʲa/ . While these older letters have been abandoned at one time or another, they may be used in this and related articles. The yers ⟨ ъ ⟩ and ⟨ ь ⟩ originally indicated
21836-458: The Russian principalities before and especially during Mongol rule. This strengthened dialectal differences, and for a while, prevented the emergence of a standardized national language. The formation of the unified and centralized Russian state in the 15th and 16th centuries, and the gradual re-emergence of a common political, economic, and cultural space created the need for a common standard language. The initial impulse for standardization came from
22042-467: The Soviet Union. On 4 February 2009, the Russian Air Force resumed flights with the MiG-29. However, in March 2009, 91 MiG-29s of the Russian Air Force required repair after inspections due to corrosion; approximately 100 MiGs were cleared to continue flying at the time. The Russian Aerospace Forces started an update of its early MiG-29s to the more current MiG-29SMT standard, but financial difficulties prevented delivery of more than three MiG-29 SMT upgrade to
22248-458: The Soviet era can speak Russian, other generations of citizens that do not have any knowledge of Russian. Primary and secondary education by Russian is almost non-existent. In Uzbekistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication. It has some official roles, being permitted in official documentation and is the lingua franca of the country and the language of the elite. Russian
22454-520: The Soviet fighter force was planned to be approximately 33% PFI and 67% LPFI. PFI and LPFI paralleled the USAF's decision that created the "Lightweight Fighter" program and the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon and Northrop YF-17 . The PFI fighter was assigned to Sukhoi, resulting in the Sukhoi Su-27 , while the lightweight fighter went to Mikoyan. Detailed design work on the resultant Mikoyan Product 9 , designated MiG-29A , began in 1974, with
22660-755: The USAF planned to order at least 650, possibly up to 1,400 production F-16s. In the Navy Air Combat Fighter competition, on 2 May 1975, the Navy selected the YF-17 as the basis for what would become the McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet . The U.S. Air Force initially ordered 15 full-scale development (FSD) aircraft (11 single-seat and four two-seat models) for its flight test program which was reduced to eight (six F-16A single-seaters and two F-16B two-seaters). The YF-16 design
22866-467: The United Nations. Education in Russian is still a popular choice for both Russian as a second language (RSL) and native speakers in Russia, and in many former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics. In Belarus , Russian is a second state language alongside Belarusian per the Constitution of Belarus . 77% of
23072-619: The West at that time. The Soviet Union did not assign official names to most of its aircraft, although nicknames were common. Unusually, some Soviet pilots found the MiG-29's NATO reporting name, " Fulcrum ", to be a flattering description of the aircraft's intended purpose, and it is sometimes unofficially used in Russian service. The MiG-29 was widely exported in downgraded versions, known as MiG-29 9-12A for Warsaw Pact and MiG-29 9-12B for non-Warsaw Pact nations, with less capable avionics and no capability for delivering nuclear weapons . In
23278-576: The YF-16 and YF-17 , respectively, with the first flights of both prototypes planned for early 1974. To overcome resistance in the Air Force hierarchy, the Fighter Mafia and other LWF proponents successfully advocated the idea of complementary fighters in a high-cost/low-cost force mix. The "high/low mix" would allow the USAF to be able to afford sufficient fighters for its overall fighter force structure requirements. The mix gained broad acceptance by
23484-610: The ability to use austere runways), excellent agility, Mach 2+ speed, and heavy armament. The Russian aerodynamics institute TsAGI worked in collaboration with the Sukhoi design bureau on the aircraft's aerodynamics. By 1971, however, Soviet studies determined the need for different types of fighters. The PFI program was supplemented with the Perspektivnyy Lyogkiy Frontovoy Istrebitel ( LPFI , or "Advanced Lightweight Tactical Fighter") program;
23690-545: The addition of new avionics, subsystems, turbofan engines and radars. Indian MiG-29s were used extensively during the 1999 Kargil War in Kashmir by the Indian Air Force to provide fighter escort for Mirage 2000s attacking targets with laser-guided bombs . The MiG-29's good operational record prompted India to sign a deal with Russia in 2005 and 2006 to upgrade all of its MiG-29s for US$ 888 million. Under
23896-506: The air forces of 25 other nations. As of 2024, it is the world's most common fixed-wing aircraft in military service, with 2,145 F-16s operational. US Vietnam War experience showed the need for air superiority fighters and better air-to-air training for fighter pilots. Based on his experience in the Korean War and as a fighter tactics instructor in the early 1960s, Colonel John Boyd with mathematician Thomas Christie developed
24102-437: The air that day. Abkhazia 's administration claimed its own forces shot down the drone with an L-39 aircraft "because it was violating Abkhaz airspace and breaching ceasefire agreements." UN investigation concluded that the video was authentic and that the drone was shot down by a Russian MiG-29 or Su-27 using an R-73 heat seeking missile. On 16 July 2014, a Ukrainian Su-25 was shot down, with Ukrainian officials stating that
24308-411: The aircraft conducted flying displays at the 1989 Paris Air Show where it was involved in a non-fatal crash during the first weekend of the show. The Paris Air Show display was only the second display of Soviet fighters at an international air show since the 1930s. Western observers were impressed by its apparent capability and exceptional agility. Following the disintegration of the Soviet Union, most of
24514-454: The aircraft during high- g combat maneuvers, various switches and function controls were moved to centralized hands on throttle-and-stick (HOTAS) controls upon both the controllers and the throttle. Hand pressure on the side-stick controller is transmitted by electrical signals via the FBW system to adjust various flight control surfaces to maneuver the F-16. Originally, the side-stick controller
24720-533: The aircraft is commonly known by the nickname "Viper". In addition to active duty in the U.S. Air Force, Air Force Reserve Command , and Air National Guard units, the aircraft is also used by the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team, the US Air Combat Command F-16 Viper Demonstration Team, and as an adversary/aggressor aircraft by the United States Navy . The F-16 has also been procured by
24926-436: The aircraft to return to straight and level flight attitude if the pilot releases the controls. This reduces maneuverability as the inherent stability has to be overcome and increases a form of drag known as trim drag . Aircraft with relaxed stability are designed to be able to augment their stability characteristics while maneuvering to increase lift and reduce drag, thus greatly increasing their maneuverability. At Mach 1 ,
25132-431: The aircraft's attitude is stable but control surfaces are ineffective. The pitch limiter locks the stabilators at an extreme pitch-up or pitch-down attempting to recover . This can be overridden so the pilot can "rock" the nose via pitch control to recover. Unlike the YF-17, which had hydromechanical controls serving as a backup to the FBW, General Dynamics took the innovative step of eliminating mechanical linkages from
25338-403: The aircraft's mission changed from solely air-to-air combat to multirole operations. Changes in operational use and additional systems have increased weight, necessitating multiple structural strengthening programs. The F-16 has a cropped- delta wing incorporating wing-fuselage blending and forebody vortex -control strakes ; a fixed-geometry, underslung air intake (with splitter plate ) to
25544-567: The aircraft. As of 2024 Flight Global estimates that 809 MiG-29s, of all types, are in service with air forces, making it the 5th most common active fighter. In the mid-1960s, the United States Air Force (USAF) encountered difficulties over the skies of Vietnam. Supersonic fighter bombers that had been optimized for low altitude bombing, like the F-105 Thunderchief , were found to be vulnerable to older MiG-17s and more advanced MiGs which were much more maneuverable. In order to regain
25750-403: The broader sense of expanding the use of Russian alongside or in favour of other languages. The current standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language ( современный русский литературный язык – "sovremenny russky literaturny yazyk"). It arose at the beginning of the 18th century with the modernization reforms of the Russian state under the rule of Peter
25956-411: The computer architecture to accept NATO standard weapons. The interface would be difficult; however with a "crude modification", such as an e-tablet, it would be possible. While the MiG-29's true capabilities could only be estimated from the time it first appeared In 1977 until the mid-1980s, a combination of persistent intelligence and increasing access afforded by the Soviet foreign sales effort allowed
26162-417: The consonant but rather by changing the following vowel. Another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels . Stress , which is often unpredictable, is not normally indicated orthographically , though an optional acute accent may be used to mark stress – such as to distinguish between homographic words (e.g. замо́к [ zamók , 'lock'] and за́мок [ zámok , 'castle']), or to indicate
26368-420: The control stick and rudder pedals to the flight control surfaces . The F-16 is entirely reliant on its electrical systems to relay flight commands, instead of traditional mechanically linked controls, leading to the early moniker of "the electric jet" and aphorisms among pilots such as "You don't fly an F-16; it flies you." The quadruplex design permits " graceful degradation " in flight control response in that
26574-572: The country. There is an Israeli TV channel mainly broadcasting in Russian with Israel Plus . See also Russian language in Israel . Russian is also spoken as a second language by a small number of people in Afghanistan . In Vietnam , Russian has been added in the elementary curriculum along with Chinese and Japanese and were named as "first foreign languages" for Vietnamese students to learn, on equal footing with English. The Russian language
26780-654: The deal, the Indian MiGs were modified to be capable of deploying the R-77 /RVV-AE (AA-12 'Adder') air-to-air missile. The missiles had been tested in October 1998 and were integrated into the IAF's MiG-29s. The IAF has also awarded the MiG Corporation another US$ 900 million contract to upgrade all of its 69 operational MiG-29s. These upgrades will include a new avionics kit, with the N019 radar being replaced by
26986-580: The debris from the drone collided with the aircraft and forced the pilot to eject. Ukrainian sources claim that the pilot shot down five drones and two cruise missiles shortly before the crash. The downed MiG-29 was wearing a livery similar to that of the Ukrainian Falcons display team. According to the Ukrainian State Bureau of Investigation: "the jet collided with debris from a destroyed drone, which caused massive damage to it to
27192-406: The earlier MiG-23 and other Soviet aircraft for ease of conversion, rather than on ergonomics . Nonetheless, the MiG-29 does have substantially better visibility than most previous Soviet jet fighters, thanks to a high-mounted bubble canopy . Upgraded models introduce " glass cockpits " with modern liquid-crystal (LCD) multi-function displays (MFDs) and true HOTAS. The baseline MiG-29 9.12 has
27398-412: The engines generates lift , thereby reducing effective wing loading , hence improving maneuverability. The engines are fed through intake ramps fitted under the leading-edge extensions (LERXs), which have variable ramps to allow high- Mach speeds. Due to their relatively short combustor, the engines produce noticeably heavier smoke than their contemporaries. As an adaptation to rough-field operations,
27604-532: The engines. Automatic slats are mounted on the leading edges of the wings; they are four-segment on early models and five-segment on some later variants. On the trailing edge , there are maneuvering flaps and wingtip ailerons . The MiG-29 has hydraulic controls and a SAU-451 three-axis autopilot but, unlike the Su-27, no fly-by-wire control system. Nonetheless, it is very agile, with excellent instantaneous and sustained turn performance, high-alpha capability, and
27810-413: The factory and the industrial plant their local peasant dialects with their phonetics, grammar, and vocabulary, and the very process of recruiting workers from peasants and the mobility of the worker population generate another process: the liquidation of peasant inheritance by way of leveling the particulars of local dialects. On the ruins of peasant multilingual, in the context of developing heavy industry,
28016-639: The fictional Colonial Viper starfighter from the television program Battlestar Galactica , which aired at the time the F-16 entered service. On 7 June 1975, the four European partners, now known as the European Participation Group , signed up for 348 aircraft at the Paris Air Show . This was split among the European Participation Air Forces (EPAF) as 116 for Belgium, 58 for Denmark, 102 for
28222-456: The final reading amendments that state that all schools and kindergartens in the country are to transition to education in Latvian . From 2025, all children will be taught in Latvian only. On 28 September 2023, Latvian deputies approved The National Security Concept, according to which from 1 January 2026, all content created by Latvian public media (including LSM ) should be only in Latvian or
28428-587: The first flight taking place on 6 October 1977. The pre-production aircraft was first spotted by United States reconnaissance satellites in November of that year; it was dubbed Ram-L because it was observed at the Zhukovsky flight test center near the town of Ramenskoye . The workload split between TPFI and LPFI became more apparent as the MiG-29 filtered into front line service with the Soviet Air Forces (Russian: Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily [VVS]) in
28634-426: The first use of a relaxed static stability / fly-by-wire (RSS/FBW) flight control system, to achieve enhanced maneuver performance. Highly agile, the F-16 was the first fighter aircraft purpose-built to pull 9- g maneuvers and can reach a maximum speed of over Mach 2. Innovations include a frameless bubble canopy for better visibility, a side-mounted control stick, and a reclined seat to reduce g-force effects on
28840-507: The flight limiters otherwise lock in place) and recover. Besides reducing the risk of deep stalls, the larger horizontal tail also improved stability and permitted faster takeoff rotation. In the 1980s, the Multinational Staged Improvement Program (MSIP) was conducted to evolve the F-16's capabilities, mitigate risks during technology development, and ensure the aircraft's worth. The program upgraded
29046-642: The fuselage and one in each wing. The internal fuel capacity of the MiG-29 (Fulcrum-C) is 4,540 L (1,000 imp gal; 1,200 US gal) due to a larger #1 fuselage tank. For longer flights, this can be supplemented by a 1,500 L (330 imp gal; 400 US gal) centreline drop tank on the Fulcrum-A and two 1,150 L (250 imp gal; 300 US gal) underwing drop tanks on later production batches. In addition, newer models have been fitted with port-side inflight refueling probes, allowing much longer flight times by using
29252-517: The fuselage. Two other locations under the fuselage are available for sensor or radar pods. The F-16 carries a 20 mm (0.79 in) M61A1 Vulcan cannon , which is mounted inside the fuselage to the left of the cockpit. The F-16 is the first production fighter aircraft intentionally designed to be slightly aerodynamically unstable, also known as relaxed static stability (RSS), to both reduce drag and improve maneuverability. Most aircraft are designed to have positive static stability, which induces
29458-631: The generation of immigrants who started arriving in the early 1960s). Only about 25% of them are ethnic Russians, however. Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the overwhelming majority of Russophones in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn in New York City were Russian-speaking Jews. Afterward, the influx from the countries of the former Soviet Union changed the statistics somewhat, with ethnic Russians and Ukrainians immigrating along with some more Russian Jews and Central Asians. According to
29664-480: The government bureaucracy for the lack of a reliable tool of communication in administrative, legal, and judicial affairs became an obvious practical problem. The earliest attempts at standardizing Russian were made based on the so-called Moscow official or chancery language, during the 15th to 17th centuries. Since then, the trend of language policy in Russia has been standardization in both the restricted sense of reducing dialectical barriers between ethnic Russians, and
29870-725: The idea of competitive prototyping . As a result, in May 1971, the Air Force Prototype Study Group was established, with Boyd a key member, and two of its six proposals would be funded, one being the Lightweight Fighter (LWF). The request for proposals issued on 6 January 1972 called for a 20,000-pound (9,100 kg) class air-to-air day fighter with a good turn rate, acceleration, and range, and optimized for combat at speeds of Mach 0.6–1.6 and altitudes of 30,000–40,000 feet (9,100–12,000 m). This
30076-471: The issue", Antony said. Despite concerns of Russia's grounding, India sent the first six of its 78 MiG-29s to Russia for upgrades in 2008. The upgrade program will fit the MiGs with a phased array radar (PESA) and inflight refuelling capability. In January 2010, India and Russia signed a US$ 1.2 billion deal under which the Indian Navy would acquire 29 additional MiG-29Ks, bringing the total number of MiG-29Ks on order to 45. The MiG-29K entered service with
30282-425: The kind of situational awareness routinely enjoyed by pilots operating comparable US aircraft. Analysts and Western pilots who flew examples of the MiG-29 thought this likely prevented even very good pilots from harnessing the plane's full combat capability. Later MiG-29s were upgraded to improve their capabilities. The Soviet Union exported MiG-29s to several countries. Because 4th-generation fighter aircraft require
30488-430: The last Iraqi purchase, the company was negotiating an F-16 sale to Bahrain that would be produced in Greenville. This contract was signed in June 2018, and the first planes rolled off the Greenville line in 2023. The F-16 is a single-engine, highly maneuverable, supersonic, multirole tactical fighter aircraft. It is much smaller and lighter than its predecessors but uses advanced aerodynamics and avionics, including
30694-408: The limited air superiority enjoyed over Vietnam, the US refocused on air combat using the F-4 Phantom multirole fighter, while the Soviet Union developed the MiG-23 in response. Towards the end of the 1960s, the USAF started the "F-X" program to produce a fighter dedicated to air superiority, which led to the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle being ordered for production in late 1969. At the height of
30900-420: The loss of one channel renders the FLCS a "triplex" system. The FLCC began as an analog system on the A/B variants but has been supplanted by a digital computer system beginning with the F-16C/D Block 40. The F-16's controls suffered from a sensitivity to static electricity or electrostatic discharge (ESD) and lightning . Up to 70–80% of the C/D models' electronics were vulnerable to ESD. A key feature of
31106-573: The loss was due to pilot error since the IAF determined the air crew did not adequately defend themselves. On 16 July 2024, the last single-seat F-16C Barak-1 (‘Lightning’ in Hebrew) were retired; the Israeli Air Force continue to use the F-16D Brakeet and F-16I Sufa two-seat variants. During the Soviet–Afghan War , PAF F-16As shot down between 20 and 30 Soviet and Afghan warplanes ; the political situation however resulted in PAF officially recognizing only 9 kills which were made inside Pakistani airspace. From May 1986 to January 1989, PAF F-16s from
31312-404: The main air inlet can be closed completely and the auxiliary air inlet on the upper fuselage can be used for takeoff, landing and low-altitude flying, preventing ingestion of ground debris . Thereby the engines receive air through louvers on the LERXs which open automatically when intakes are closed. However the latest variant of the family, the MiG-35 , eliminated these dorsal louvers, and adopted
31518-409: The mesh screens design in the main intakes, similar to those fitted to the Su-27. The MiG-29 has a ferry range of 1,500 km (930 mi) without external fuel tanks, and 2,100 km (1,300 mi) with external tanks. The internal fuel capacity of the original MiG-29 (Fulcrum-A) is 4,300 L (950 imp gal; 1,100 US gal) distributed between six internal fuel tanks , four in
31724-422: The mid-1980s. While the heavy, long range Su-27 was tasked with the more exotic and dangerous role of deep air-to-air sweeps of NATO high-value assets, the smaller MiG-29 directly replaced the MiG-23 in the frontal aviation role. In the West, the new fighter was given the NATO reporting name "Fulcrum-A" because the pre-production MiG-29A, which should have logically received this designation, remained unknown in
31930-409: The most geographically widespread language of Eurasia . It is the world's seventh-most spoken language by number of native speakers , and the world's ninth-most spoken language by total number of speakers . Russian is one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station , one of the six official languages of the United Nations , as well as the fourth most widely used language on
32136-408: The navalised Mikoyan MiG-29K ; the most advanced member of the family to date is the Mikoyan MiG-35 . Later models frequently feature improved engines, glass cockpits with HOTAS -compatible flight controls, modern radar and infrared search and track (IRST) sensors, and considerably increased fuel capacity; some aircraft have also been equipped for aerial refueling . Following the dissolution of
32342-417: The newly built Block 15s with the Operational Capability Upgrade (OCU). The OCU introduced the 23,770 lbf (105.7 kN) F100-PW-220, later installed on Block 32 and 42 aircraft: the main advance being a Digital Electronic Engine Control (DEEC) unit, which improved reliability and reduced stall occurrence. Beginning production in 1988, the "-220" also supplanted the F-15's "-100", for commonality. Many of
32548-420: The northwestern Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region . Russian was also the main foreign language taught in school in China between 1949 and 1964. In Kazakhstan , Russian is not a state language, but according to article 7 of the Constitution of Kazakhstan its usage enjoys equal status to that of the Kazakh language in state and local administration. The 2009 census reported that 10,309,500 people, or 84.8% of
32754-455: The official first flight occurred on time. The YF-16's first supersonic flight was accomplished on 5 February 1974, and the second YF-16 prototype first flew on 9 May 1974. This was followed by the first flights of Northrop's YF-17 prototypes on 9 June and 21 August 1974, respectively. During the fly-off, the YF-16s completed 330 sorties for a total of 417 flight hours; the YF-17s flew 288 sorties, covering 345 hours. Increased interest turned
32960-484: The older R-60 (AA-8 "Aphid"). A single 1,500 L (330 imp gal; 400 US gal) tank can be fitted to the centerline, between the engines. The US has supplied AGM-88 HARM missiles to Ukraine. It appears that they are fired from MiG-29s. It was only disclosed after Russian forces showed footage of a tail fin from one of these missiles. U.S. Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl has said this: "I would just point to two things. One, you know,
33166-515: The other hand, before the war, almost a quarter of Ukrainians were in favour of granting Russian the status of the state language, while after the beginning of Russia's invasion the support for the idea dropped to just 7%. In peacetime, the idea of raising the status of Russian was traditionally supported by residents of the south and east . But even in these regions, only a third of the respondents were in favour, and after Russia's full-scale invasion , their number dropped by almost half. According to
33372-401: The other three languages in the East Slavic branch. In many places in eastern and southern Ukraine and throughout Belarus, these languages are spoken interchangeably, and in certain areas traditional bilingualism resulted in language mixtures such as Surzhyk in eastern Ukraine and Trasianka in Belarus. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect , although it vanished during the 15th or 16th century,
33578-446: The parliament approved a bill to close up all Russian language schools and kindergartens by the school year. The transition to only Estonian language schools and kindergartens will start in the 2024-2025 school year. In Latvia , Russian is officially considered a foreign language. 55% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 26% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 18 February 2012, Latvia held
33784-453: The peasants' speech was never systematically studied, as it was generally regarded by philologists as simply a source of folklore and an object of curiosity. This was acknowledged by the noted Russian dialectologist Nikolai Karinsky , who toward the end of his life wrote: "Scholars of Russian dialects mostly studied phonetics and morphology. Some scholars and collectors compiled local dictionaries. We have almost no studies of lexical material or
33990-488: The pilot without obstructing the view; being able to keep their head "out of the cockpit" improves the pilot's situation awareness . Further flight and systems information are displayed on multi-function displays (MFD). The left-hand MFD is the primary flight display (PFD), typically showing radar and moving maps; the right-hand MFD is the system display (SD), presenting information about the engine, landing gear, slat and flap settings, and fuel and weapons status. Initially,
34196-402: The pilot. It is armed with an internal 20 mm M61 Vulcan cannon in the left wing root and has multiple locations for mounting various missiles, bombs and pods. It has a thrust-to-weight ratio greater than one, providing power to climb and vertical acceleration. The F-16 was designed to be relatively inexpensive to build and simpler to maintain than earlier-generation fighters. The airframe
34402-409: The pilots to have extensive training, air-defense infrastructure, and constant maintenance and upgrades, MiG-29s have had mixed operational history with different air forces. The MiG-29 was first publicly seen in the West when the Soviet Union displayed the aircraft in Finland on 2 July 1986. Two MiG-29s were also displayed at the Farnborough Airshow in Britain in September 1988. The following year,
34608-408: The point where it crashed near a village in northeast Vinnytsia. The pilot managed to eject and is currently receiving treatment in the hospital." On 20 September 2023, a Ukrainian Air Force MiG-29 was struck by a ZALA Lancet drone at the Dolgintsevo air base near Kryvyi Rih . A second drone was used as a spotter, recording the first Lancet's impact. India was the first international customer of
34814-406: The population aged 15 and above, could read and write well in Russian, and understand the spoken language. In October 2023, Kazakhstan drafted a media law aimed at increasing the use of the Kazakh language over Russian, the law stipulates that the share of the state language on television and radio should increase from 50% to 70%, at a rate of 5% per year, starting in 2025. In Kyrgyzstan , Russian
35020-418: The population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 67% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2019 Belarusian census , out of 9,413,446 inhabitants of the country, 5,094,928 (54.1% of the total population) named Belarusian as their native language, with 61.2% of ethnic Belarusians and 54.5% of ethnic Poles declaring Belarusian as their native language. In everyday life in
35226-427: The pronunciation of ultra-short or reduced /ŭ/ , /ĭ/ . Because of many technical restrictions in computing and also because of the unavailability of Cyrillic keyboards abroad, Russian is often transliterated using the Latin alphabet. For example, мороз ('frost') is transliterated moroz , and мышь ('mouse'), mysh or myš' . Once commonly used by the majority of those living outside Russia, transliteration
35432-414: The proper pronunciation of uncommon words or names. Russian is an East Slavic language of the wider Indo-European family . It is a descendant of Old East Slavic , a language used in Kievan Rus' , which was a loose conglomerate of East Slavic tribes from the late 9th to the mid-13th centuries. From the point of view of spoken language , its closest relatives are Ukrainian , Belarusian , and Rusyn ,
35638-416: The reactor for the creation of nuclear weapons . The following year, during the 1982 Lebanon War Israeli F-16s engaged Syrian aircraft in one of the largest air battles involving jet aircraft, which began on 9 June and continued for two more days. Israeli Air Force F-16s were credited with 44 air-to-air kills during the conflict. In January 2000, Israel completed a purchase of 102 new F-16I aircraft in
35844-412: The remaining 63 MiGs will be upgraded at the HAL facility in India. India also awarded a multi-million-dollar contract to Israel Aircraft Industries to provide avionics and subsystems for the upgrade. In March 2009, the Indian Air Force expressed concern after 90 MiG-29s were grounded in Russia. After carrying out an extensive inspection, the IAF cleared all MiG-29s in its fleet as safe in March 2009. In
36050-415: The required timeframe and still fit within the MiG-29's nose. Rather than design a new radar, Phazotron reverted to a version of the Sapfir-23ML's twisted-polarization cassegrain antenna and traditional analog signal processors, coupled with a new NII Argon-designed Ts100 digital computer to save time and cost. This produced a working radar system, but inherited the weak points of the earlier design, plaguing
36256-491: The respondents), while according to the 2002 census – 142.6 million people (99.2% of the respondents). In Ukraine , Russian is a significant minority language. According to estimates from Demoskop Weekly, in 2004 there were 14,400,000 native speakers of Russian in the country, and 29 million active speakers. 65% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 38% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 5 September 2017, Ukraine's Parliament passed
36462-542: The scope of upgrades, which often involve the addition of more power-hungry avionics. Lockheed won many contracts to upgrade foreign operators' F-16s. BAE Systems also offers various F-16 upgrades, receiving orders from South Korea, Oman, Turkey, and the US Air National Guard; BAE lost the South Korean contract because of a price breach in November 2014. In 2012, the USAF assigned the total upgrade contract to Lockheed Martin. Upgrades include Raytheon's Center Display Unit, which replaces several analog flight instruments with
36668-427: The seat angle and the canopy's thickness, the ejection seat lacks canopy-breakers for emergency egress; instead the entire canopy is jettisoned prior to the seat's rocket firing. The pilot flies primarily by means of an armrest-mounted side-stick controller (instead of a traditional center-mounted stick ) and an engine throttle; conventional rudder pedals are also employed. To enhance the pilot's degree of control of
36874-439: The secretary were the YF-16's lower operating costs, greater range, and maneuver performance that was "significantly better" than that of the YF-17, especially at supersonic speeds. Another advantage of the YF-16 – unlike the YF-17 – was its use of the Pratt & Whitney F100 turbofan engine, the same powerplant used by the F-15; such commonality would lower the cost of engines for both programs. Secretary McLucas announced that
37080-414: The single turbofan jet engine; a conventional tri-plane empennage arrangement with all-moving horizontal "stabilator" tailplanes; a pair of ventral fins beneath the fuselage aft of the wing's trailing edge; and a tricycle landing gear configuration with the aft-retracting, steerable nose gear deploying a short distance behind the inlet lip. There is a boom-style aerial refueling receptacle located behind
37286-425: The single-piece "bubble" canopy of the cockpit. Split-flap speedbrakes are located at the aft end of the wing-body fairing, and a tailhook is mounted underneath the fuselage. A fairing beneath the rudder often houses ECM equipment or a drag chute . Later F-16 models feature a long dorsal fairing along the fuselage's "spine", housing additional equipment or fuel. Aerodynamic studies in the 1960s demonstrated that
37492-626: The survey carried out by RATING in August 2023 in the territory controlled by Ukraine and among the refugees, almost 60% of the polled usually speak Ukrainian at home, about 30% – Ukrainian and Russian, only 9% – Russian. Since March 2022, the use of Russian in everyday life has been noticeably decreasing. For 82% of respondents, Ukrainian is their mother tongue, and for 16%, Russian is their mother tongue. IDPs and refugees living abroad are more likely to use both languages for communication or speak Russian. Nevertheless, more than 70% of IDPs and refugees consider Ukrainian to be their native language. In
37698-459: The syntax of Russian dialects." After 1917, Marxist linguists had no interest in the multiplicity of peasant dialects and regarded their language as a relic of the rapidly disappearing past that was not worthy of scholarly attention. Nakhimovsky quotes the Soviet academicians A.M Ivanov and L.P Yakubinsky, writing in 1930: The language of peasants has a motley diversity inherited from feudalism. On its way to becoming proletariat peasantry brings to
37904-432: The theory. Air Force F-X proponents were opposed to the concept because they perceived it as a threat to the F-15 program, but the USAF's leadership understood that its budget would not allow it to purchase enough F-15 aircraft to satisfy all of its missions. The Advanced Day Fighter concept, renamed F-XX , gained civilian political support under the reform-minded Deputy Secretary of Defense David Packard , who favored
38110-418: The time of the prototypes' fly-off, defining the relationship between the LWF and the F-15. The YF-16 was developed by a team of General Dynamics engineers led by Robert H. Widmer . The first YF-16 was rolled out on 13 December 1973. Its 90-minute maiden flight was made at the Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards AFB , California, on 2 February 1974. Its actual first flight occurred accidentally during
38316-615: The two. Others divide the language into three groupings, Northern , Central (or Middle), and Southern , with Moscow lying in the Central region. The Northern Russian dialects and those spoken along the Volga River typically pronounce unstressed /o/ clearly, a phenomenon called okanye ( оканье ). Besides the absence of vowel reduction, some dialects have high or diphthongal /e⁓i̯ɛ/ in place of Proto-Slavic * ě and /o⁓u̯ɔ/ in stressed closed syllables (as in Ukrainian) instead of Standard Russian /e/ and /o/ , respectively. Another Northern dialectal morphological feature
38522-454: The use of the language has some presence in certain areas. A large part of the population, especially the older generations, can speak Russian as a foreign language. However, English has replaced Russian as lingua franca in Lithuania and around 80% of young people speak English as their first foreign language. In contrast to the other two Baltic states, Lithuania has a relatively small Russian-speaking minority (5.0% as of 2008). According to
38728-413: The war in the east of the country. During the initial days of the war in Donbas in April 2014, the Ukrainian Air Force deployed some jet fighters over the Donetsk region to perform combat air patrols and show of force flights. Probably due to the limited number of jet fighters available, a MiG-29 belonging to the Ukrainian Falcons display team was spotted armed with a full air-to-air load and performing
38934-413: The winning ACF design to equip five tactical fighter wings. Though computer modeling predicted a close contest, the YF-16 proved significantly quicker going from one maneuver to the next and was the unanimous choice of those pilots that flew both aircraft. On 13 January 1975, Secretary of the Air Force John L. McLucas announced the YF-16 as the winner of the ACF competition. The chief reasons given by
39140-399: Was accepted by the USAF on 6 January 1979. The aircraft entered USAF operational service with the 34th Tactical Fighter Squadron , 388th Tactical Fighter Wing , at Hill AFB in Utah, on 1 October 1980. The F-16 was given its name of "Fighting Falcon" on 21 July 1980. Its pilots and crews often use the name "Viper" instead, because of a perceived resemblance to a viper snake as well as to
39346-416: Was altered for the production F-16. The fuselage was lengthened by 10.6 in (0.269 m), a larger nose radome was fitted for the AN/APG-66 radar, wing area was increased from 280 to 300 sq ft (26 to 28 m ), the tailfin height was decreased, the ventral fins were enlarged, two more stores stations were added, and a single door replaced the original nosewheel double doors. The F-16's weight
39552-405: Was augmented pitch control to avoid deep stall conditions at high angles of attack. The stall issue had been raised during development but had originally been discounted. Model tests of the YF-16 conducted by the Langley Research Center revealed a potential problem, but no other laboratory was able to duplicate it. YF-16 flight tests were not sufficient to expose the issue; later flight testing on
39758-470: Was delivered to the Ukrainian Air Force in July 2020. In August 2020, Ukraine began negotiations with Elbit Systems to help modernize the MiG-29 fleet. On 29 May 2020, Ukrainian MiG-29s took part in the Bomber Task Force in Europe with American B-1B bombers for the first time in the Black Sea region. In September 2020, B-52 bombers from the 5th Bomb Wing conducted vital integration training with Ukrainian MiG-29s and Su-27s inside Ukraine's airspace. During
39964-405: Was first introduced in North America when Russian explorers voyaged into Alaska and claimed it for Russia during the 18th century. Although most Russian colonists left after the United States bought the land in 1867, a handful stayed and preserved the Russian language in this region to this day, although only a few elderly speakers of this unique dialect are left. In Nikolaevsk, Alaska , Russian
40170-421: Was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 19% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2014 Moldovan census , Russians accounted for 4.1% of Moldova's population, 9.4% of the population declared Russian as their native language, and 14.5% said they usually spoke Russian. According to the 2010 census in Russia , Russian language skills were indicated by 138 million people (99.4% of
40376-433: Was increased by 25% over the YF-16 by these modifications. The FSD F-16s were manufactured by General Dynamics in Fort Worth, Texas , at United States Air Force Plant 4 in late 1975; the first F-16A rolled out on 20 October 1976 and first flew on 8 December. The initial two-seat model achieved its first flight on 8 August 1977. The initial production-standard F-16A flew for the first time on 7 August 1978 and its delivery
40582-505: Was limited by the original inlet to a thrust of 25,735 lbf (114.47 kN), the Modular Common Inlet Duct allowed the F110 to achieve its maximum thrust of 28,984 lbf (128.93 kN). (To distinguish between aircraft equipped with these two engines and inlets, from the Block 30 series on, blocks ending in "0" (e.g., Block 30) are powered by GE, and blocks ending in "2" (e.g., Block 32) are fitted with Pratt & Whitney engines.) The Increased Performance Engine (IPE) program led to
40788-418: Was non-moving, but this proved uncomfortable and difficult for pilots to adjust to, sometimes resulting in a tendency to "over-rotate" during takeoffs, so the control stick was given a small amount of "play". Since the introduction of the F-16, HOTAS controls have become a standard feature on modern fighters. The F-16 has a head-up display (HUD), which projects visual flight and combat information in front of
40994-408: Was placed so it was rearward of the nose but forward enough to minimize air flow losses and reduce aerodynamic drag . Although the LWF program called for a structural life of 4,000 flight hours, capable of achieving 7.33 g with 80% internal fuel; GD's engineers decided to design the F-16's airframe life for 8,000 hours and for 9- g maneuvers on full internal fuel. This proved advantageous when
41200-407: Was reportedly still not satisfied with the performance of the system and demanded another upgrade. The latest upgraded aircraft, MiG-29M, offered the N010 Zhuk-M , which has a planar array antenna rather than a dish, improving range, and a much superior processing ability, with multiple-target engagement capability and compatibility with the Vympel R-77 (or RVV-AE). Armament for the MiG-29 includes
41406-433: Was rolled into a new Air Combat Fighter (ACF) competition in an announcement by U.S. Secretary of Defense James R. Schlesinger in April 1974. The ACF would not be a pure fighter, but multirole , and Schlesinger made it clear that any ACF order would be in addition to the F-15, which extinguished opposition to the LWF. ACF also raised the stakes for GD and Northrop because it brought in competitors intent on securing what
41612-454: Was shot down in northern Israel when it was hit by a relatively old model S-200 (NATO name SA-5 Gammon) surface-to-air missile of the Syrian Air Defense Force. The pilot and navigator ejected safely in Israeli territory. The F-16I was part of a bombing mission against Syrian and Iranian targets around Damascus after an Iranian drone entered Israeli airspace and was shot down. An Israel Air Force investigation determined on 27 February 2018 that
41818-422: Was shot down by pro-Russian rebels in the Luhansk region. The Ukrainian government confirmed the downing. The pilot ejected safely and was recovered by friendly forces. As of 2018, the Lviv State Aircraft Repair Plant began domestically upgrading the MiG-29 to have multirole capability, known as the MiG-29MU2. Development was expected to be completed by 2019 and enter production in 2020. The first upgraded MiG-29
42024-515: Was the region where USAF studies predicted most future air combat would occur. The anticipated average flyaway cost of a production version was $ 3 million . This production plan was hypothetical as the USAF had no firm plans to procure the winner. Five companies responded, and in 1972, the Air Staff selected General Dynamics' Model 401 and Northrop's P-600 for the follow-on prototype development and testing phase. GD and Northrop were awarded contracts worth $ 37.9 million and $ 39.8 million to produce
42230-402: Was the sixth-most used language on the top 1,000 sites, behind English, Chinese, French, German, and Japanese. Despite leveling after 1900, especially in matters of vocabulary and phonetics, a number of dialects still exist in Russia. Some linguists divide the dialects of Russian into two primary regional groupings, "Northern" and "Southern", with Moscow lying on the zone of transition between
42436-428: Was touted at the time as "the arms deal of the century". These were Dassault-Breguet's proposed Mirage F1M-53 , the Anglo-French SEPECAT Jaguar , and the proposed Saab 37E "Eurofighter" . Northrop offered the P-530 Cobra, which was similar to the YF-17. The Jaguar and Cobra were dropped by the MFPG early on, leaving two European and two U.S. candidates. On 11 September 1974, the U.S. Air Force confirmed plans to order
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