Thousands thronged Marina beach today too – people are excited and elated, heads are looking up into sky and people blur out names of Aircrafts! – all the buzz as Indian Air Force special airshow is to be held coming Sunday, and there have been rehearsals with aircrafts flying at supersonic speeds over Marina beach, Triplicane.
The Motto of Indian Air Force is :Touch the sky with Glory, which has been taken from eleventh chapter of the Gita, the Discourse given by Lord Krishna to Arjuna on the battlefield of Kurukshetra during the Great War of Mahabharata.
As the sky is dotted with fighter aircrafts, people reel out the names of : Sukhoi,, Jaguar, Mirage,indigenously manufactured state of the art Light Combat Aircraft Tejas, Light Combat Helicopter Prachand and Heritage aircraft like Dakota and Harvard – then .. .. all are waiting to see ‘Rafale’. Suryakiran is a formation aerobatic team, and Sarang is a helicopter aerobatic team, - simple overawing !!
On a simplistic note, we have stood in long queues in Petrol pumps especially when heavy vehicles drivers went on strike. Decades ago, people owning Lambretta, Luna mopeds would go on panic mode, stocking up before the budget !-imagine an aircraft that is special, that provides Aerial refueling
Aerial refueling is the process of transferring aviation fuel from one aircraft (the tanker) to another (the receiver) while both aircraft are in flight. The two main refueling systems are probe-and-drogue, which is simpler to adapt to existing aircraft and the flying boom, which offers faster fuel transfer, but requires a dedicated boom operator station. The procedure allows the receiving aircraft to remain airborne longer, extending its range or loiter time. A series of air refuelings can give range limited only by crew fatigue/physical needs and engineering factors such as engine oil consumption. Because the receiver aircraft is topped-off with extra fuel in the air, air refueling can allow a takeoff with a greater payload which could be weapons, cargo, or personnel: the maximum takeoff weight is maintained by carrying less fuel and topping up once airborne.
The public joint stock company Ilyushin Aviation Complex,is a former Soviet and now a Russian aircraft manufacturer and design bureau, founded in 1933 by Sergey Vladimirovich Ilyushin. One of the aircrafts on display is ‘Ilyushin”.
The Ilyushin Il-78 [NATO reporting name Midas) is a Soviet/Russian four-engined aerial refueling tanker based on the Il-76 strategic airlifter. The Soviet Union's first dedicated tanker aircraft were variants of preexisting bombers, like the Tupolev Tu-16 and Myasishchev M-4. Their performance was deemed insufficient, especially so since new bomber models were slated to enter service.Indian Air Force has more than half a dosen Il-78MKIs delivered in operated by No. 78 Squadron at Agra AFS.
Here are couple of photos of Ilyushin, other aircrafts and dare-devilry of helicopters – crossing at close range too !!
Hail Indian Air Force !
With regards – S Sampathkumar
2.10.2024
