What F-102 units were called up for Viet Nam

On Sun, 07 Sep 2003 17:43:17 -0400, av8r
wrote:

Hi Peter

The first operational deployment to Viet by F-102's was actually on the
21st of March 1962. Deuces of the 509th FIS deployed to Tan Son Nhut.
They returned 8 days later on the 29th. For the next year during Water
Glass ops, they rotated every six weeks with U.S. Navy AD5Q's.

Project Bell Tone 1 commenced in December 1960 with six F-100D's of the
510th TFS were deployed to Don Muang Airport. They were replaced by six
F-102A's of the 509th FIS nine months later.


Peter, let's keep this thread going if possible. It's extremely
interesting. Are you interested in F-102 losses in country?

I used to love watching the F-102's of the 59th FIS roaring around while
I was at Goose Bay, Labrador (June 64-June 67). The odd time a Deuce of
the 57th FIS would come down from Kef for a visit. Lots of good Bear
hunting back in those days too.


Cheers...Chris

Does anyone know what the accidental lose rate for the -102 was? I
have heard that it was pretty high, which for an early single engine
delta is easy to believe.

Al Minyard

The February '91 issue of Wings has a cover photo of two camouflaged
F-102s in a revetment, and an article called "Unsheathing the Dagger,"
about the F-102 in Vietnam.

Author Warren Thompson says the 509th FIS at Clark AB got orders to
deploy on the morning of 5 August 1964. Within 2 1/2 hours they had
four planes at Danang, "making the 509th the first fighter squadron to
deploy aircraft to Vietnam following the Gulf of Tonkin incident."

There are some interesting war stories in the article. One describes
hunting VC at night with the IRST. It was "an excellent piece of
equipment," according to a former pilot, able to track a guy smoking a
cigarette from 30,000 feet. They would detect campfires and fire IR
missiles at them, then follow up with radar missiles visually aimed at
the explosions.

Another pilot thought the F-102's dozen 2.75 inch rockets were better
(but not much better) than its AIM-4s, which he called "of little
value against ground targets." However, on one of his missions they
fired AIM-4s unguided and saved a downed aircrew from capture.

Somebody asked about the F-102 accident rate. Statistics for current
and retired USAF aircraft are he
http://afsafety.af.mil/AFSC/RDBMS/Fl...aft_stats.html

(Javascript must be enabled for the page to work.)

--

Paul Hirose

In article ,
Alan Minyard writes:
On Sun, 07 Sep 2003 17:43:17 -0400, av8r
wrote:

Hi Peter

The first operational deployment to Viet by F-102's was actually on the
21st of March 1962. Deuces of the 509th FIS deployed to Tan Son Nhut.
They returned 8 days later on the 29th. For the next year during Water
Glass ops, they rotated every six weeks with U.S. Navy AD5Q's.

Project Bell Tone 1 commenced in December 1960 with six F-100D's of the
510th TFS were deployed to Don Muang Airport. They were replaced by six
F-102A's of the 509th FIS nine months later.


Peter, let's keep this thread going if possible. It's extremely
interesting. Are you interested in F-102 losses in country?

I used to love watching the F-102's of the 59th FIS roaring around while
I was at Goose Bay, Labrador (June 64-June 67). The odd time a Deuce of
the 57th FIS would come down from Kef for a visit. Lots of good Bear
hunting back in those days too.


Cheers...Chris

Does anyone know what the accidental lose rate for the -102 was? I
have heard that it was pretty high, which for an early single engine
delta is easy to believe.

Check out the USAF Safety Office at:

http://afsafety.af.mil/AFSC/RDBMS/Fl...aft_stats.html

They've got stats on all manner of stuff, from 1950 on, ranging, with
some holes, from F-47s to the F-22, and all manner of types in
between.

According to them, the F-102 had a lifetime Class A accident rate of
13.69/100K flight hours, with 357 Class A accidents between 1953
(first loss), to 1981 (last loss)

For a bit of context, here are some of the other fighter's lifelim
numbers for the Class A rate:

F-84 52.86
F-86 44.18
F-89 24.54
F-100 21.22
F-101 14.65
F-102 13.69
F-104 30.63
F-105 17.83
F-106 9.47
F-4 4.64
F-5 8.82
F-15 2.47
F-16 4.19

The Century Series and later numbers don't include combat losses.
I can't tell if that's the case for the F-84 adn F-86.

It ought to be noted that in 2 years of service, about half of all teh
F-84s built had been written off.


--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster