Final flight of the F-14 Tomcat
26 Sep 2006
Here are some stories on Saturday’s event:
Navy retires F-14, the coolest of cold warriors
Navy’s ‘Top Gun’ Tomcat Fighter Jet Makes Ceremonial Final Flight
F-14 Tomcat takes sunset flight
The F-14 Tomcat Roars Off Into The Sunset
F-14 Tomcat Makes Its Final Flight
FAREWELL, TOMCATS: F-14 officially retires
A shot of an Independence Tomcat back in the day:
A flight deck crewman prepares to signal the pilot of an F-14 Tomcat aircraft for takeoff from the aircraft carrier USS INDEPENDENCE (CV 62), during operations off the coast of Beirut, Lebanon. 6 Dec 1983
And Tom’s old friends the Rooskies:
An air-to-air right side view of a[n] F-14 Tomcat aircraft from Fighter Squadron 51 (VF-51) as it intercepts a Soviet Tu-95 Bear-A/B aircraft. 15 Oct 1979


September 26th, 2006 at 10:08 am
I’m surprised none of those articles mention that those jets can transform into giant fighting robots or fight in space.
September 26th, 2006 at 10:30 am
I remember a day when we used to retire fighters with hardly a glance back because everyone was more excited about the airplane replacing it than they were sad about the one retiring. My how our once mighty defense industry has fallen.
September 26th, 2006 at 11:32 am
Soviet F-14 Tomcat aircraft from Fighter Squadron 51 (VF-51)’ Soviet F-14 eh? I know commies liked to reverse engineer our aircraft- but intercepting their own aircraft with copied planes!
September 26th, 2006 at 11:55 am
Whoa! I didn’t even notice that, Steve. I just copied and pasted from a DoD site. I will fix.