How the F-117 was shot down

[vladanr]

The running joke amongst the serbs was: Sorry we didn't know it was invisible.

[taquojesus]

It wasn’t a failure on the plane’s part, it was a combination of complacent planning and pure luck. The Nighthawks were flying the same route every night and the Serbs were watching the airfield they took off from so they knew the route. This is the poor planning part.

The luck part is the guy operating the radar got a lock just as the nighthawk was releasing it’s payload. With the bomb bay doors open, when it has the largest radar return. One of the two missiles fired missed. Before that the operator swept the Nighthawk twice and couldn’t get a lock.

The Operations Room and Lazerpig cover this better than I can in a comment on a video, but it was never really a design or equipment problem. It was just the perfect storm.

[rs]

Soldiers: “Shall we destroy the wreckage of the plane so the stealth capabilities don’t get stolen?”
Command: “Nah that technology is 20 years old and we have been working on way better stuff”

[ANUBISseyes]

“The military made no effort to destroy the plane”
The Chinese embasy in Serbia where the wreckage got transported: “…”

[shonuff]

The Serbs also knew when the plane would take off, and had knowledge of the path the plane would take, so they were about to anticipate when and where the plane was. They also used an RF signal commonly used by cellular devices.

[TheSteam]

The jet flying the same route constantly while air defenders kept moving around meant that at SOME point, the plane was bound to get hit.

[theambassadorllc]

Also limited SEAD ROE meant the threat from AA was higher which ultimately lead to an incident like this

[rommedegraauw]

From what I understand, it wasn't really an active counterstrategy that did the plane in, but rather not changing the flight paths regularly. The Serbs literally ambushed the plane by knowing the fixed route it was going to take, and even then they only barely managed to land the hit.

[muzanjackson]

A little bit of info the add on that but during the f-117 shoot down it was basically all luck as when the radar systems went up they found nothing but Danny the man who shot it down broke protocol and did more sweeps when he did that he managed to detect the nighthawk at the one point it could be detected when it had its bomb bay doors open
Edit: I should prob answer some comments as I was lazy when writing this but 2 main things is that one it was basically all luck the Serbs knew that the f117s were doing night raids yes but they had no way to detect them unless the bomb bay doors are open two Danny was the only man to break protocol because procedure was to do 2 sweeps and then turn radar off

[oliverthatcher]

it is so 'stealthy' it has to fly around the enemy radar so they can't detect it?

[afon_s]

F-117: I'm invisible😎
Soviet missile: What does 'invisible' mean?🤔

[muzanjackson]

This comment section is gonna give me an migraine with how wrong some people are

[majesticscope]

Most stealth advanced aircraft was shot down by 1960s Soviet weapon wow 😂😂😂😂

[TechnoDelta]

I think I also heard, they usually flew with radar jamming planes "growlers." But that night they didn't. Indeed, a "perfect storm."

[seancoate]

They got crazy lucky and locked it out up when the bomb bay was open.

[hubertcumberdale]

Th freaking air intakes had wipers that de-iced them. ❤

[smooky]

U2, and f117 were the masterpiece of American technology, and both were downed by old soviet missiles 😄

[CHMichael]

.... actually the pilots always came the same route.

[patrickm]

I object to using BM21 footage when discussing AD

[Noobmaster_]

It wasn't a failure on the plane's part. The used short wave radar. And it is not only f 117. 6 f 117s and one B-2 were shot down over serbia in 1999.