Original video from DVIDS.
The Air Force built the A-10 around a single purpose: killing tanks. In the 1960s, with Soviet armor numbers in Europe far outpacing NATO’s, the Air Force launched the Attack Experimental program to find a dedicated close air support aircraft that could survive over the battlefield and destroy armored vehicles at close range. Fairchild Republic’s YA-10A beat out Northrop’s YA-9A design, first flying on May 10, 1972, and entering production in 1973.
Everything about the A-10 was built around its 30mm GAU-8 Avenger cannon, a seven-barrel rotary gun so large that the aircraft was essentially designed around it rather than the other way around. Firing depleted uranium armor-piercing rounds at nearly 4,000 rounds per minute, the GAU-8 could tear through Soviet tank armor from the air. The rest of the aircraft was built to survive the fight: a titanium “bathtub” surrounds the cockpit to protect the pilot, the twin engines are mounted high and separated to reduce the chance both are knocked out by a single hit, and the aircraft can fly and land with one engine, half a wing, or a damaged tail.
Pilots and troops alike nicknamed it the “Warthog” for its blunt, unglamorous looks, a nickname that stuck through decades of service in the Gulf War, Afghanistan, and Iraq, where its slow speed and heavy armament made it a favorite of ground troops calling in close air support.
Aircraft: Fairchild Republic A-10A Thunderbolt II
- Length: 53 ft 4 in (16.2 m)
- Wingspan: 57 ft 6 in (17.5 m)
- Height: 14 ft 8 in (4.4 m)
- Empty weight: approximately 24,000 to 25,000 lb (10,900 to 11,300 kg)
- Max takeoff weight: 51,000 lb (23,130 kg)
- Engines: two General Electric TF34-GE-100 turbofans, 9,065 lb thrust each
- Top speed: 420 mph (676 km/h)
- Combat range: approximately 800 to 950 mi (varies significantly with loadout and mission profile)
- Service ceiling: 45,000 ft (13,716 m)
- Armament: one 30mm GAU-8/A Avenger seven-barrel rotary cannon, plus up to 16,000 lb (7,257 kg) of bombs, missiles, and rockets on eleven hardpoints