All good though, free air show. Rattled the house though when two of the F16's gunned it a few weeks ago. Can sympathise with them close to base though getting buzzed many times a day if the deal comes to fruition with the Singapore Air Force. We used to have Iroquois breaking the sound barrier with their rotor tips banging past over to Linton, now it's the NH90's are buzzing us late at night. Couldn't even see them in the dark but apparently they were have a practice over the Plaza Car Park in town--or maybe winching onto the roof of the Plaza building [guessing]. Anyway--not complaining, just sayin. No Jets for a years then maybe regular fast & furious again. Hope it brings money to the areas out there which i'm sure it will. Blimey, just lookin--28--30 million each--that's all lol.
nice_lady,
Oct 1, 6:31am
Is this the Singapore airforce again ? Not the Nz airforce ? Two things. If it's the Nz airforce what the hell do we need to spend this money on these toys for ? Any serious attempt to overrun us by anyone at all would steamroll the place.
If it's the Singapore airforce this only helps to put a big fat target on us ! We don't need that either. It's dumb to say the least.
serf407,
Oct 1, 6:34am
Waihopai and other places would already be targeted.
r.g.nixon,
Oct 1, 6:43am
NZ doesn't have any enemies at the moment. Neither does Singapore, does it?
lookoutas,
Oct 1, 6:44am
Better than living next door to Trump.
noswalg,
Oct 1, 6:46am
Did a fair bit of pruning around Manawatu/Rangitikei when I was in the Forestry back in the day, the Skyhawk's used to come down through the gully's practicing low level flying. Was a pretty awesome sight to see, sometimes I was looking down on them!
sw20,
Oct 1, 6:48am
It’s not the fact of having enemies. It’s doing your share with your friends around the world.
Many people don’t realise, but the Skyhawks were largely funded via Australia because they wanted us to train with, so they footed many of the bills, that would have carried on with the F16s.
tim41,
Oct 1, 6:49am
typical hippie attitude,doesn't want other country's military here,but when something goes wrong they put up their hands for help quick fast.you cant have your mung beans and eat em so get back to your drum circle and smoke some more pot
r.g.nixon,
Oct 1, 6:54am
The F15 and F16 have been around for a surprisingly *long* time. I remember talking to an American F15 pilot at Ohakea - must have been nearly 30 years ago!
ianab,
Oct 1, 7:10am
I think the problem Singapore has is that the place is tiny. By the time the pilot gets an F15 up to speed, he's in someone else's air space. Not to mention how busy their airspace probably is. From Ohakea, they can cruise out over the Tasman Sea and actually open the planes up.
Noise? If they take off on afterburners, you are going to notice. They do this at airshows to show off. A routine takeoff would be little louder than an old Skyhawk was.
gunhand,
Oct 1, 7:16am
No no no, any invading country would have to get past the mighty Haka first. I mean could you imagine a modern tooled up army bursting their way onto the beaches or by air and being meet by a loud ferocious looking bunch of Moria doing that war dance? Then to back them up you have,the All Blacks, Olympic team members, Olympic team supporters, Silver Ferns, Tall Blacks, White Socks, Black Caps, Wheel Blacks, Black Sticks, Water Blacks?, Team NZ, The Navy, The Army, The Air force, The Police, All under and over 16 rugby,soccer and league teams, The Boy Scouts, The Girl Guides, Every school in NZ, The Warriors, That Softball team, That group that always turns up at airports when someone even remotely important turns up, and at any unavailing and funeral, The Mongrel Mob and Black Power etc etc etc etc all stomping their feet waving their arms about and poking out of many tongue and speaking in tongues. I know I would turn and run away. or just mow them all down with a Minigun.
geoff_m,
Oct 1, 7:51am
Don't we live in an incredibly benign strategic environment?
serf407,
Oct 1, 8:21am
There are US military assets based in Christchurch during the summer Antarctic program. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Deep_Freeze If you wish to listen to the NZ Skyhawk story in some detail and have a spare hour and a half. https://youtu.be/F5sFmyxQSro (90 minute audio/ slide on rnzaf skyhawks) Armed nzdf planes in the future? -I think I read that there is consideration for putting Hellfire missiles on the P8 patrol jet, that nz might get to replace the p3s. Might be high energy laser weapons that are plane carried by then to sink errant fishing boats in nz waters though or armed drones (2nd hand global hawks) etc. I wonder if Team NZ could put some these together? http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/11755/u-s-air-force-global-hawk-drone-crashes-in-california
mojo49,
Oct 1, 8:29am
Fighter jets are so "Topgun". Old technology. Still hanging on as a result of 75 year old Generals in the US Air Force and Tom Cruise. Not .much use when NK launches an ICBM at the US of A.
sw20,
Oct 1, 8:31am
Quite good at putting the shits up illegal fishing vessels though.
richardmayes,
Oct 1, 10:12am
Still pretty useful for all of those occasions when nobody's pushing the button on nukes though. ? There have been plenty of wars around the world since the invention of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
I've only ever met one Iraqi, and he said George Dubya going in and wiping out Saddam Hussein and his cohorts was the best thing that's ever happened in that country.
richardmayes,
Oct 1, 10:17am
Not to mention. in the 80s the French sold Saddam Hussein a nuclear plant that could produce weapons grade plutonium. The Israelis knocked it out. with F16s.
The world might have been very different today if they hadn't. ?
nz_stacie,
Oct 1, 10:19am
Boy George stuff
the-lada-dude,
Oct 1, 7:44pm
yeah, and I bet the frogies were over the RAINBOW with that one !
the-lada-dude,
Oct 1, 7:45pm
haha, you been spraying nitrocellulose lacquer again ?
lookoutas,
Oct 1, 8:10pm
I know a Topdressing pilot who dumped a load of fertiliser on one. The cockie was so impressed at his fertiliser being wasted, he jumped in with him and told him to do it again.
elect70,
Oct 1, 10:05pm
^^ off our coast guys have been known to take pot shots with rifles at commercial fisheries draggng a 5 km net between 2 of them &coming within 2KM of the beach .
tim41,
Oct 1, 11:50pm
cool story bro
nzjay,
Oct 2, 2:44am
I can clearly remember Jap boats trawling at night with no lights along the Bay of Plenty coast around Matata. We used to surfcast at night and you'd hear the diesel thump and then the jabbering voices. Definitely within 2km, you could actually see cigarette glows, but no lights at all. They cleaned the Bay out of all fish and it took years to recover. This was in the days of a 12 mile limit around early 1960's.
rbd,
Oct 2, 3:20am
My mum tells stories of the locals shooting at the Japanese fishing boats just off shore at the mouth of the Ashburton river in the 50's and 60's. They were picking up the salmon.
The Japanese were not that popular in the area at that time for some reason.
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