Santa Claus is a regular client at Fighter Combat International. Unlike other years where he was always under training with one of our military fighter pilots, this year he takes the aircraft up solo for the first time! Fortunately, Bruce Haffner with Good Morning Arizona TV3 had a chance to grab Santa just as he was finishing his calisthenics prior to jumping in the cockpit. Also shown is a clip from Santa’s earlier in-flight training while in formation with the TV3 helicopter…

Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Basic
 
The video clip below contains several maneuvers in sequence that starts with a G-Warm-Up Exercise with alternating level 3-G turns, an Inside Loop followed by two Aileron Rolls. Our client “air show pilot”, Teresa, had lots of fun flying with Fighter Combat Instructor Bill Moffat, formerly a Canadian and US [...]

David arrived at Fighter Combat wanting to see everything the Extra could do and was specifically interested in the Point Roll (or Hesitation Roll). After an instructional demonstration and a few practices, he was able to fly the maneuver more effectively using a slower roll rate with crisper “stops” at the 90 degree points which characterizes this maneuver.

This scene starts with aircraft flying in side-by-side tactical formation just prior to the formation lead calling “check away” to setup for the neutral high-aspect engagement. When formation is subsequently directed to “turn in” the aircraft point head-on to each other closing at over 400 mph! When the two aircraft meet at the merge, the formation lead calls “fight’s on” to start the engagement. Watch and listen as BJ coaches Mud Ball through this high-energy fun-filled dogfight against Mud Ball’s brother-in-law, Blondie. Don’t let the results of this engagement fool you, in the next engagement (not included here), Blondie sets a Fighter Combat International record of 12.95 seconds from merge to guns kill.

The cockpit scene you view on this clip is about 1/2 way through an air combat engagement that was initiated with a high-aspect head-on pass at approximately 7,000′ MSL (5,500′ above ground level) with a closing velocity of about 500 miles per hour. In this clip, Eric follows the Fighter Combat instructor pilot’s coaching from a position of slight advantage to a position of effectively employing a lethal gun attack on the adversary aircraft. Watch Eric fly and listen as Smo highlights various air combat concepts to Eric discussed the mission briefing for him to apply to the actual engagement.

This video was taken by the Channel 3 helicopter in the Fighter Combat International training area in the eastern corner of the Phoenix Valley in Arizona. Check it out as Santa Claus flys a series of aerobatics to show the kids his flying skills in preparation for his Christmas flying duties with the Reindeer and Sleigh!

Alex arrived at Fighter Combat excited to gather some great experiences to tell his friends about back in Italy. He wanted to see everything the Extra could do. As you’ll see in the included video sampling below, his wishes came true and had a blast flying with Fighter Combat pilot, Paul BJ Ransbury, just 2-days before Christmas.

Client Air Show Pilot: Ryan Laughlin
INVERTED FLIGHT
AEROBATIC MANEUVER
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Basic
 
What’s Happening? In this video clip (below), Paul BJ Ransbury demonstrates Inverted Flight to Ryan. Mid-way through the maneuver Ryan takes control, waves to the camera and then proceeds to recover to upright flight.
Inverted Flight is accomplished by ensuring the aircraft is at [...]

Client Air Show Pilot: Dennis Suding
THE UPRIGHT ACCELERATED FLAT SPIN
AEROBATIC MANEUVER
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced
 
What’s Happening? In this video clip the Fighter Combat pilot (Paul BJ Ransbury) talks the client (Dennis) through the entry and recovery of this particular advanced aerobatic maneuver. The specific recovery BJ takes him through is the Beggs-Mueller Emergency Spin [...]

Fighter Combat Instructor: Paul BJ Ransbury
Client Air Show Pilot: Carl McElroy
THE LOMCEVAK TUMBLE
AEROBATIC MANEUVER
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Extreme
 
What’s Happening? The Lomcevak – (pronounced LOHM-sheh-vock). A Czechoslovakian word translated as “Berserk Headache”, it is actually a colloquialism meaning “Drunken Bum.” The Lomcevak, also called the lump-lump, appears to be a totally out-of-control maneuver in which [...]

Over 1/2 Mile Spinning Upside Down
Descending at 8,000 Feet Per Minute
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced
NOTE: THIS MANEUVER IS NOT FOR EVERYONE
HOWEVER, THE TAILSLIDE IS ALWAYS AN OPTION ON
ANY MISSION PROFILE IF YOU CHOOSE TO SEE IT
 
What’s Happening?The Inverted Spin can simply be described as a rapid descent during which the aircraft is in inverted [...]

Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced
NOTE: THIS MANEUVER IS NOT FOR EVERYONE
HOWEVER, IT IS ALWAYS AN OPTION ON
ANY MISSION PROFILE IF YOU CHOOSE TO SEE IT
HISTORY OF THE OUTSIDE LOOP:
(Reprinted from: www.u-s-history.com)
James H. Doolittle 1896-1993: In 1927, Doolittle was the first person to successfully execute an outside loop — previously thought to be a fatal [...]

Client Air Show Pilot: Nils Hammon
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Basic
In this video clip , Paul BJ Ransbury demonstrates the Hammerhead to Nils who came to Fighter Combat International all the way from Germany with his wife Stephanie. They sure had fun today doing aerobatics and will be going head-to-head in our advanced air combat course on Thursday. Although Nils has a PhD in Physics, after watching his wife fly today, we’re not convinced it’s going to help him against her in air combat … the final results will speak for themselves

Client Air Show Pilot: Mike Harris
AEROBATIC MANEUVER
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced

In this video clip the Fighter Combat pilot Paul BJ Ransbury demonstrates then talks the client (Mike) through the entry and recovery of this particular advanced aerobatic maneuver last Friday, 4 March 2005.

Client Air Show Pilot: Sean McAleavy
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Basic

In this video clip (below), Fighter Combat Instructor Pilot (Paul BJ Ransbury), demonstrates the first half of the Cuban Eight maneuver and then has client-pilot, Sean, fly the second half. Sean is not a pilot and has never done aerobatics before beyond his F-15 flight simulator at home. The Cuban Eight combines the inside loop and aileron roll together to let the pilot do a bit of sky writing. When done properly, observers will see what looks like a figure eight laying on its side (diagram below). The image shown to the left is a clip from the right wingtip video camera as the aircraft passes the vertical up position pulling around to the top of the first loop.

Client Air Show Pilot: Jim Saloga
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced
In this video clip (below), Paul BJ Ransbury demonstrates the Vertical Point Roll to Jim. Jim comes to Fighter Combat as a proud participant of the Copperwynd Resort Adventure Package. The maneuver detailed on this page combines the precision of flying the vertical line with the performance of a rolling maneuver with hesitations at each 90 degrees of roll.

Advanced Air Combat Mission – High Aspect Air Combat Engagement Video: This clip is from our Advanced Air Combat Mission. In addition to single-day events, Fighter Combat International also provides multi-day and week-long training courses that are available all year around! At our air combat school in Mesa, Arizona USA, we specialize in providing the general public the opportunity of enjoying this outdoor adventure activity with real fighter pilots in real aerobatic aircraft. No flight experience is required – this is NOT an air combat simulation. If you like air combat games like Fighter Ace, Air Combat Patrol, Air to Air Combat and other air combat simulations then you’ll love flying REAL air combat under the guidance of our REAL air combat fighter pilot instructors in REAL aircraft. Please let us know what you think of this “fight-to-music clip” by filling out our survey below…

Below is a Sample Clip from an Introduction to Air Combat Mission Profile.

Client Air Show Pilot: Seth Wilson
Category (Basic, Advanced or Extreme): Advanced
In this video clip (below), instructor Clarke “Otter” McNeace talks customer Seth (aka Viking) through the Torque Roll. Seth is an Arizona local adventurer from Anthem, AZ. He sure had fun doing aerobatics and went head-to-head in our advanced air combat course in the same [...]