YF-17 — The Cobra Survivors

For many, the YF-17 Cobra is a little-known footnote in late 20th century military aircraft history. But its bloodlines developed into two very important front-line Navy jets, one of which is just starting its long career. To begin this story, we have to rewind to the mid- and late-1960's. Northrop was doing a good business supplying F-5 jets to the free world. The F-5A Freedom Fighter was a small, simple aircraft that was easy to fly, easy to maintain, and did its job in a cost-effective manner. Northrop came to the conclusion that there would be a global market for an up-rated version of the F-5 that could fly Mach 2. This plane was called the P-530.

The P-530 program was unveiled in early 1971. While it was a capable aircraft, there were no buyers. To make matters worse, the USAF was afraid of the P-530, thinking that it could cause problems for the F-15 Eagle program. The P-530 program stumbled since foreign nations were not going to buy a plane that the USAF did not use. The F-15 itself was in flux given that the Soviets unveiled the Mig-25, which could hit Mach 2.8, faster than any front-line western jet. As a result, the F-15 was enlarged to carry bigger engines, more fuel, longer range radar, and heavier weapons. That made the F-15 price that much more expensive.

The growth of the F-15 turned out to be an opportunity in disguise. The F-15 was now so expensive that the USAF could not afford to equip all of its squadrons. The Pentagon came up with the concept of a smaller and less expensive Lightweight Fighter Program. Eventually, the nod was given to General Dynamics to build two YF-16 demonstrators, while Northrop would build two YF-17s based on the P-530 (now called the P-600). The Air Force would fly the prototypes head to head and pick a winner.

Both the YF-16 and YF-17 performed well. The YF-17 became the first USAF aircraft to break the sound barrier in level flight without using afterburners. While the YF-17 outperformed the YF-16 in many areas, the YF-16 used a proven engine, it had longer range, and was less expensive. As a result, the YF-16 won the contest, and went on to be produced in large numbers as the Fighting Falcon. The two YF-17 were sent to NASA, which used them for research for a few years before retiring the two prototypes.

That was not, however, the end of the story. The US Navy needed an airplane to replace the carrier-based F-4 Phantom II, A-6 Intruder, and A-7 Corsair II. The Navy preferred two engines when flying over open water, so the F-16 was not a choice. Northrop determined that they could adapt the YF-17 design to naval use by refining the design and beefing up the landing gear. The Navy accepted the proposal, and the F-18 program was born.

As the Hornet, the F-18 was produced in large numbers. First came the A model, a single seat, and the two seat B. A second version followed, the single seat C and two seat D. Over time, the Navy became aware of problems with the Hornet, namely, short range and light bomb load. A new generation of Super-Hornets were deployed, F-18 E and F models that are about 30 percent larger than the original Hornet, and the Cobra it descended from.