This F/A-18 Hornet Landed on a U.S. Carrier. The Catch: The NON-U.S. Pilot

WarIsBoring

Security,

What is going on? 

The Finnish navy has no need for carriers, and its reason for existence is primarily coastal defense provided by a small fleet of minelaying and fast-attack craft. The most important Finnish naval project at the moment is the Squadron 2020 project, which aims to build four corvettes armed with U.S.-made RIM-162 Evolved SeaSparrow anti-aircraft missiles, anti-ship missiles, torpedoes and mines.

On March 17, 2017 in the Atlantic, a fighter jet landed onto the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln. The only difference this time was that the pilot was Finnish, not American.

Capt. Juha “Stallion” Jarvinen’s landing was the first landing on an aircraft carrier by a Finnish air force pilot in history, according to the U.S. Navy. Jarvinen was flying a U.S. Marine F/A-18C Hornet with Marine Fighter Attack Training Squadron 101 as part of a pilot exchange program — also a first between the U.S. Marines and the Finnish air force.

(This first appeared several months ago.)

“It was pretty intense,” Jarvinen said according to a U.S. Navy news release. “I was extremely happy because I knew I actually caught the wire when I felt the sensation of rapidly slowing down, but at the same time I was a little disappointed because I caught the second wire and not the third.”

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Nimitz-class aircraft carriers — with two exceptions, the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush — have four arresting wires, or cables. Catching the third cable is safest, but the snagging the second one isn’t bad.