Zoom Climbs - The Highest Life and Death Jet Flights to the Edge of Space.

The F104 incident with Chuck Yeager reminded me that the guy truly had a guardian angel in his life. Reading his autobiography, it was a miracle he lived into old age. He survived being shot down in an aerial dogfight in WW II Europe, eluded capture, and flew again in combat missions. Prior to that in stateside, while in combat aircraft training in the East, on weekends he'd fly West to visit his wife, where he admitted that due to exhaustion, he dozed-off at the controls, with the aircraft maintaining a circular flight path while asleep. Another time with sharing the flying duties with a fellow pilot in a transport plane, again to fly from East to West to visit his wife, they set the plane's controls to autopilot to get some shuteye, only to be fortunate enough to awaken in time to realize the plane was flying into a mountainside box canyon, whereupon they took control of the plane to advert a crash.

I am an aviation writer and I have had the good fortune to experience this in several tactical jet types, including the F-104 mentioned at the beginning, as well as the F-15 and F/A-18. I gotta say, it's pretty close to the most fun you can have with or without your pants on.

Ever since I was a little kid I have loved the F-104 Starfighter. Everything about that jet is cool, even the name. Speed, power, futuristic 1950s space age looks. Pure Kelly Johnson badassery, the hell with utility, just make it fast as hell.

F-104 Starfighter, the only airplane to attempt the interception of a Constitution Class Starship. (Albeit a crippled one limping along at a lower than usual altitude. ;) ) Bluejay 4: "Whatever this thing is, it's big!"

123,000 ft from a MiG25 in 1977, a record that still stands is impressive.

I remember the scene towards the end of "The Right Stuff" when Chuck Yeager does that altitude record attempt in an F-104. At the time I didn't understand the context nor the purpose of Yearger's flight, and if I recall, the movie plays it as if Yeager has "gone rogue". Anyway, this video fills in some crucial missing context, thank you!

I cant help but to think back to the ending scene of "The Right Stuff" where Yeager "goes after that Ol'Russian record" in his F-104! Cheers from Texas!

It was the pre-compressor cooling via water/methanol injection that enabled the Foxbat to get to 123k ft. The F-4H Phantom II "Skyburner" had that as well. There have been many projects over the years that have looked into using that for enabling turbine engines to operate at high altitudes and speeds (Hermeus is the latest).

The English Electric Lightning was an amazing example of climb to height records. Still one of my favourite aircraft. The F-106 went so far, as to carry nuclear air-to-air missiles, with the hope of a single missile destroying multiple enemy craft in the blast.

Astronaut Frank Borman was at ARPS at the time as an instructor, and in his book he excoriated Yeager for that flight. The NF-104 was not designed for high altitude flights like that, and Yeager's accident helped lead to the aircraft being phased out of ARPS. Borman was angered that a perfectly good teaching tool was sullied by Yeager's attempt to showboat.

High Altitude Zoom Climbs are so much more dangerous than most people realize!

The f-104 was never designed to be an air superiority fighter, it was purely designed as an interceptor

I recently read that an old German saying went as "if you want your own F-104, just buy a small stretch of land, and will fall on it eventually". Given the Germans' history with it, I wouldn't be surprised if it's true. 😂😂😂

Say, Ridley... Ya got a stick o' Beemans?

One of my favorite aerospace subjects! Steely eyed missle men. Thanks for your hard work and Best Regards!

Fascinating as always Paul!

You got any Beemans? Yeah I might have a stick or 2…

Thanks for this awesome mini-doc, Paul. I had never heard of "zoom climbs" until today.

In the late 1960s I had a friend who was a USAF F-4 pilot. He told me that unofficially he'd done the maneuver, going so high that he could see stars in the daytime.

Thank you, Paul, for a great video about the challenges of high-altitude flight and the dangers.