This week's entry is much more of an "interesting" than a "beautiful" plane. In fact, the plane is pretty homely but attractive in that odd way that only straight-wing jet fighters can be. The F-89 Scorpion:

This fighter, aside from having an interesting profile and decent performance for a non-swept-wing jet, was the USAF's first interceptor to be armed with air-to-air nuclear rockets.

You heard me right. In the 1950s, the Air Force developed an air-to-air missile (the AIR-2 Genie) with a nuclear warhead designed to take out an entire squadron of Russian bombers at a time.

The F-89 carries the distinction of being the first (and only) plane ever to fire and detonate a nuclear-armed air-to-air missile, on 19 July 1957. I've looked for pictures of the test-firing but can't find any.

Earlier Aircraft Cheesecake entries here, here, and here.

Update: One of Jonah Goldberg's "military guys" is holding an ugly plane contest. Check it out.

Posted by: JohnL at 10:57 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 165 words, total size 2 kb.