Photo: USAF/Staff Sgt. Zachary Rufus
Impressive photos only require two things: an eye trained to spot the perfect moments to be snapped on camera, and a hand fast enough to press that button at just the right time. One simple look at this image here is enough to reveal both those criteria were met.
Every week, the U.S. Air Force (USAF) releases a pic or two snapped by its personnel during various events held across the nation and the world. Some of them are so impressive they go straight into autoevolution's Photo of the Day section.
The image we have here was part of last week's USAF release, but depicts something that happened earlier in July. It shows the F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team's plane flying in the skies over Sacramento, California, during the Capitol Air Show held two weeks ago.
The F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team is part of the 388th Fighter Wing operating out of Hill Air Force Base in Davis County, Utah. It's a relatively young team, having been established in 2018 in an effort to show civilians what the fifth-generation aircraft is capable of.
The team comprises only one plane and its pilot, but it is backed by 14 maintainers and supporting personnel. Traditionally, the F-35 flying demo runs has been piloted by a female pilot.
The current pilot of the aircraft is Capt. Melanie "MACH” Kluesner, who took on the role in March 2024. In the time that has passed since that moment and the instance this photo was snapped, Kluesner had already been seen in the sky at no less than 11 air shows across the U.S.
The plane she is flying is the F-35A version, which was born to replace the aging fleet of F-16 Fighting Falcons and A-10 Thunderbolt IIs. Since the plane arrived in 2016, plans changed a bit, but that doesn't make the F-35 any less relevant.
Like all its siblings, this aircraft is powered by a single Pratt & Whitney turbofan engine capable of developing 43,000 pounds of thrust. That's more than enough to shoot the plane to top speeds of Mach 1.6 (1,200 mph/1,976 kph).
The aircraft can carry an assortment of weapons, depending on the mission profile, but the one used during air shows is, naturally, unarmed. That's more than visible in the image that brought us here today: the plane, shining rusty in the evening Sun, has a completely clean underbelly as it passes under the Moon, apparently narrowly missing it.
If you found this image interesting enough to have you wondering when and where you'll be able to see the plane in action next, you should know that in August the F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team will travel to Seattle in the first weekend of the month (that's the end of this week), Atlantic City on August 14, Latrobe on August 17, and the McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas in the last weekend of the month.
The image we have here was part of last week's USAF release, but depicts something that happened earlier in July. It shows the F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team's plane flying in the skies over Sacramento, California, during the Capitol Air Show held two weeks ago.
The F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team is part of the 388th Fighter Wing operating out of Hill Air Force Base in Davis County, Utah. It's a relatively young team, having been established in 2018 in an effort to show civilians what the fifth-generation aircraft is capable of.
The team comprises only one plane and its pilot, but it is backed by 14 maintainers and supporting personnel. Traditionally, the F-35 flying demo runs has been piloted by a female pilot.
The current pilot of the aircraft is Capt. Melanie "MACH” Kluesner, who took on the role in March 2024. In the time that has passed since that moment and the instance this photo was snapped, Kluesner had already been seen in the sky at no less than 11 air shows across the U.S.
The plane she is flying is the F-35A version, which was born to replace the aging fleet of F-16 Fighting Falcons and A-10 Thunderbolt IIs. Since the plane arrived in 2016, plans changed a bit, but that doesn't make the F-35 any less relevant.
Like all its siblings, this aircraft is powered by a single Pratt & Whitney turbofan engine capable of developing 43,000 pounds of thrust. That's more than enough to shoot the plane to top speeds of Mach 1.6 (1,200 mph/1,976 kph).
The aircraft can carry an assortment of weapons, depending on the mission profile, but the one used during air shows is, naturally, unarmed. That's more than visible in the image that brought us here today: the plane, shining rusty in the evening Sun, has a completely clean underbelly as it passes under the Moon, apparently narrowly missing it.
If you found this image interesting enough to have you wondering when and where you'll be able to see the plane in action next, you should know that in August the F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team will travel to Seattle in the first weekend of the month (that's the end of this week), Atlantic City on August 14, Latrobe on August 17, and the McConnell Air Force Base in Kansas in the last weekend of the month.
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