‘Iowa the Air Traffic Controllers could not believe that they had an F-14 Tomcat under their control and so very low…500ft/152m,’ John Chesire, former US Navy F-14 Tomcat pilot
The development of Soviet long-range patrol and bomber aircraft during the Cold War required a fleet defense fighter capable of engaging high-altitude bombers that were well beyond visual range. Grumman’s response was the iconic F-14 Tomcat. With the long-range AIM-54 Phoenix air-to-air missiles equipped on them, F-14s were able to engage enemy targets more than 90 miles distant. Grumman created the F-14’s highly effective variable-sweep wing, which allowed it to fly at a variety of airspeeds, in response to the need for an interceptor to be able to go at a high speed while carrying heavy ordnance.
The new “Tomcat,” named for Grumman’s tradition of naming its aircraft after cats, flew for the first time in December 1970. The first F-14As were delivered to the Navy in June 1972 after a series of modifications during flight testing, with Fighter Squadron (VF) 124 assigned to crew training. The new aircraft were first flown by operational squadrons VF-1 and VF-2 on the West Coast and by Atlantic fleet Tomcat squadrons VF-14 and VF-32 on the East Coast.
Through its encounters with Libyan aircraft in the 1980s and its appearance on screen in the very successful movie Top Gun—which included a memorable scene in which an F-14 piloted by Maverick and Goose buzzed the tower—the Tomcat came to represent a period of history.
During former F-14 Tomcat pilot John Chesire’s career, something similar occurred.
As he recalls on Quora, the event took place in the skies over Iowa.
‘I once flew across the plains of Iowa, low and slow, on my way to an airshow in Cedar Rapids. Growing up as a kid on a farm in Iowa, I figured that some farm kid and their parents might enjoy seeing an F-14 for the first time, flying low over their farm. When near Waterloo, Iowa, the Air Traffic Controllers could not believe that they had an F-14 under their control and so very low… 500ft/152m. They asked me to turn around and circle them so that they could come outside their control room and see for themselves a Navy F-14 Tomcat.
‘While I did stay relatively slow, I was at 500ft AGL. I swept the wings back to 68 degrees from their full forward position and briefly lit the afterburners. I may have cycled both the wings and ABs a couple of times for them. The ATC guys apparently really liked it and thanked me profusely as I continued on to my destination.’
Photo by Paramount