These Videos Will Make You Fans of the Fleet Defender…As If You’re Not Already Fans
The F-14 Tomcat holds a special place in the hearts of its former builders, crews, maintainers, and fans. For many of them the mere mention of the Fleet Defender stirs up cherished memories and the stories start up fast and furious. This video doesn’t need a whole lot of introduction.
It’s just Tomcat videos- some with musical accompaniment, and one without. But we think you’ll enjoy them, so we brought them to you. Enjoy baby!
F-14 Tomcat Low Level
The first video is all about flying F-14s at low altitude and high speeds. Set to the Stone Temple Pilots song “Sex Type Thing”, the video was pieced together using footage shot over several years in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Squadrons appearing in the video include Fighter Squadron ONE ONE (VF-11) Red Rippers and VF-32 Swordsmen when both were stationed at Naval Air Station (NAS) Oceana in Virginia. The desert shots were shot on and over the various ranges at NAS Fallon in Nevada. The airshow shots were captured at NAS Oceana. All videos were uploaded to YouTube by Air Tales.
F-14 Tomcat at Sunset
If that didn’t get your heart moving check your pulse. To bring you back down a bit as the name suggests, this video depicts F-14Bs flying during dusk and/or dawn. The footage was captured over several years, again during the late 1990s and early 2000’s. The video is set to Joe Satriani’s song “Cryin.”
Next F-14 Tomcats Video: Airshow at Sea
Let’s get back to low and fast. This video is pieced together from two VF-11 F-14B demonstration flights- the 1998 USS Stennis (CVN-74) and 2000 USS Eisenhower (CVN-69) Tiger Cruise and Dependents Day cruises.
The first performance was shot from the Stennis and the second from the rear cockpit for the F-14B. Then both performances were edited together and set to Joe Satriani’s song “Surfing With the Alien.” The uploader informs us that for both performances the pilot was LCDR ‘Opie’ Taylor and the RIO for 1998 was LCDR ‘Bobdog’ Hennessy.
F-14B Tomcat Cockpit
This F-14 Tomcats video, shot in a VF-11 F-14B cockpit in 2000, should bring back some memories for you Tomcat crew dogs. Note that this particular Tomcat had the new Programmable Tactical Information Display (PTID) update in the rear cockpit for the RIO, but was still equipped with the old Heads Up Display (HUD) for the nose gunner.
