Gray Stealth Fighter Tested for Daytime Missions (Posted: Thursday, February 12, 2004)
<img src="httb://www.abqjournal.com/pix/020804_week/stealth02-12-04.jpg " border=0>
By Miguel Navrot
Journal Staff Writer
HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASE— To keep its cutting-edge stealth fighter hidden in broad daylight, the Air Force is trying a gray makeover.
"It's just common sense. A gray jet is harder to see during the day than a black jet," said Maj. Tre Urso, an 11-year Air Force veteran and test pilot with the stealth program.
Like bats, owls and vampires, the charcoal-black Nighthawk generally seeks its prey from dusk until dawn, striking at radar sites, communication towers and other targets.
At sunrise, however, the fighter jet's dark profile becomes visible.
Over the coming year, an experimental stealth jet painted gray will fly over southern New Mexico. Air Force evaluators want to know if the gray face can be useful in future combat.
Testing will involve human spotting, as well as measurements from electronic optics and sensors, said Lt. Col. Kevin Sullivan, who is overseeing the experiment.
The point is to gauge how visible a gray stealth is and whether gray variants are practical, said Sullivan, commander of the 53rd Test and Evaluation Group's Detachment 1 from Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada.
The gray stealth, known among base personnel as "the Dragon," was painted gray from nose to tail, though a few air intakes remain black.
Gray has been a default color for the Air Force's other fighter jets. The experimental stealth's paint scheme was based on the F/A-22 Raptor, a $200 million fighter under development, officials said.
For the past 15 years, the stealth fighter has largely owned the night skies in combat. It was the only U.S. jet to fly over Baghdad in the first war with Iraq, elusive to enemy radar screens and anti-aircraft fire.
The Air Force suffered its first and only Nighthawk combat loss in Serbia in 1999. Although the service hasn't divulged a precise cause, it is widely reported that a Soviet-designed surface-to-air missile brought down the jet.
A year ago, at the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Air Force sent the weapon over enemy territory as dawn approached. A pair of Holloman-based pilots flew two jets over Baghdad for surgical strikes aimed at Saddam Hussein and his sons.
Although nighttime had slipped away before the two dropped their payloads, overcast skies kept the pair hidden.
A gray covering on the paint could conceivably keep enemy targets vulnerable at all hours, officials said.
Air Force higher-ups will decide if more stealths will be painted gray.
This isn't the weapon's first alternate appearance. In the mid-1990s, the Air Force experimented with gray for a short while. Other historic photos show one of the jets with green and brown camouflage.
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