@ Museo del Aire, Madrid, Spain
May 2014
From my first trip to Spain and to the excellent collection of the Museo del Aire. This facility has six exhibition galleries and over 150 aircraft on display. First flown in Russia in 1966 as the Su-17, this swing-wing attack aircraft was later exported as the Su-22, the M4 model being the final production version. This Su-22 originally served in the East German Air Force. East Germany operated 48 Su-22M4 and 8 Su-22UM-3K trainers until unification, when they were transferred to the Luftwaffe. Removing single-engine strike aircraft from its inventory, the Russian Air Force retired its last Su-17M4 along with its fleet of MiG-23/27s in 1998.
