Watch a Lockheed F-104 Starfighter perform an insane low level pass over a Dutch airbase in the 1980s

August 13, 2015 Military Aviation
David Cenciotti

The “missile with a man in it” was one of the most badass planes ever.

Overall, 2,580 Lockheed Martin F-104 Starfighter aircraft flew with the air forces of 15 countries in about 50 years.

As already explained several times on The Aviationist, the F-104 represented a huge leap forward for all those countries that passed from old subsonic to a bisonic jet which called for a much greater concentration on the part of pilots who were often faced with split second decisions.

The transition from the previous generation of aircraft to the high performances of the F-104 was often far from painless and that’s why some of the Starfighter‘s users were beset by numerous tragic accidents.

Although the majority of such incidents were caused by human factor or poor weather conditions or because the aircraft was pushed to its limits rather than by plane failures, the “Zipper”, as it was nicknamed in the fighter pilots community, was nonetheless undeservedly dubbed the “widow maker” by the public opinion.

An epithet that was firmly rejected by most pilots who loved the F-104 and its stunning performance.

Anyway, here is a video of a “Zipper” flying dangerously low. According to the comments on the Youtube page it was filmed in the early 1980s at Volkel airbase, in the Netherlands, and shows a Royal Netherlands Air Force F-104 buzzing spotters during an Open Day.

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About David Cenciotti
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David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.

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7 Comments

  2. Yeh the good old days before too many display restrictions came in! I recall being a kid at the Air Tattoo around 1980 and being close enough to an F111 that it blew my ice cream away ;)

  4. I watched a Canadian demo team perform at Ramstein’s Flugtag back in 1979 or 80. They few CF-104s. On a solo pass, the pilot rolled inverted at low altitude. His nose dropped and he almost face-planted on the runway. He shoved the stick forward and climbed away, missing the runway by perhaps 20 feet. The F-104 was a beautiful plane but from all I’ve read, it was very unforgiving of mistakes.

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