The Mig 29 "Fulcrum"
Day 2 saw me at the Zukovskiy Air Base, the former top secret airbase of Russia. Another medical check and then it was time to work out the flight profile with my pilot, Alexander Pavlov.
I had planned to fly in the Mig 25 but sadly, it was out of service so we were flying in the Mig 29 but rather than the combat maneuvers I still wanted to do the high altitude and speed flight. After the briefing it was off to suit up into my pressure suit, helmet and mask then a short ride to the hangar where my Mig 29 was waiting.
This is a
current front line fighter jet, equal to anything in the west, in some ways
better and what a machine it looked standing there..
I was
strapped into the cockpit, my video and still camera at the ready.
The engines started and built up revs and we taxied to the runway. After clearance from the tower, the whine of the engines increased and we hurtled down the runway at breakneck speed then, we were airborne. We climbed to 3,000 metres where I was invited to take control of the aircraft, my only previous flight experience was learning to fly helicopters and here I was in control of a state of the art fighter jet. Alex asked if I was ready for speed and to climb. The throttles went forward and the mach indicator went up. At 1.8 mach he pointed the nose skywards and we climbed. We rocketed upwards at about 7,000 metres per minute. At 20,000 metres Alex said we had gone as high as we could and turned the plane over on its left wing and we did a 3 G turn towards earth. The sky was a deep blue, almost black and clouds covered the ground way below.
The g-forces pushed me deep into my seat but I was still able to snap some great photo’s and get video footage of the transition between the atmosphere and space. As we approached the air base again, we dropped to 150 metres and did a high speed run along the runway before pulling another 3.5 G tight turn back around to line up with the runway to land.
Back at the hangar I climbed down from the cockpit and expressed my thanks to Alex who informed me that I was the first Australian to fly in the Mig 29. I can’t wait to go back and fly the combat maneuvers at upto 9 G’s.
Now it was time to head back to get changed into my next flight suit.
