Corgi AA37402 McDonnell-Douglas A-4F Skyhawk U.S. Navy "The Blue Angels" aerobatics team, Pensacola NAS, Florida, 1974 - 85
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AA37402 McDonnell-Douglas A-4F Skyhawk U.S. Navy "The Blue Angels" aerobatics team, Pensacola NAS, Florida, 1974 - 85
Limited Edition - Released in 2008
At the end of World War II, Chester W. Nimitz, Chief of Naval Operations, ordered the formation of a flight demonstration team. The Blue Angels performed their first display in June 1946, flying the Grumman F6F Hellcat.
By the end of the 1940s, they were flying their first jet aircraft, the Grumman F9F-2 Panther. After the Korean War, the team reformed at NAS Corpus Christi, Texas, remaining there until 1954 when they relocated to their present home at NAS Pensacola, Florida, progressing to the swept-wing Grumman F9F-8 Cougar.
The ensuing 20 years saw the Blue Angels transition to two more aircraft, the Grumman F11F-1 Tiger (1957) and the McDonnell Douglas F-4J Phantom II (1969). In December 1974, the Team began flying the McDonnell Douglas A-4F Skyhawk and was redesignated as the Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron.
Designed to replace the antiquated, propeller-driven AD Skyraider, the A-4 Skyhawk was first flown on June 22, 1954. Douglas exceeded the original design requirements by delivering a carrier-capable aircraft that was only half the Navy's weight specification and so compact that it did not need folding wings.
The A-4 was the first to use "buddy" air-to-air refuelling (an A-4 could refuel other aircraft of the same type), which was helpful when operating in remote locations where dedicated tankers were impractical. The A-4 served the US Navy until 2003 and remained the preferred warplane for the Marine Corps until the 1980s, even after the introduction of the A-7 Corsair II.