12/19/2024
The history of E-006... From the ashes to the fire🔥
On December 19, 2002, E-006 was on a mission over Afghanistan. On the way home to Kyrgyzstan, where the Danish detachment was stationed, the weather at the base was unexpectedly very bad with dense fog.
E-006 and the other aircraft that were part of the formation therefore had to return to Afghanistan to land there.
Both planes had just refueled and were therefore heavy, as the weather periodically improved at Bagram, so they chose to land.
E-006 was first to land, but the runway was unexpectedly very slippery due to a combination of a lot of dust and rain. There were no cables at the end of the runway, so the pilot could not use the hook to stop the plane.
When the pilot realized he could not stop the plane, he followed the procedure and ejected himself with the ejection seat.
E-006 continued beyond the end of the runway and into an old Russian minefield.
Luckily, the pilot landed unharmed on a path that went next to the minefield.
The second aircraft in the formation had to abort its landing and circled over the base afterwards.
As the pictures show, E-006 buried itself in the desert sand, with a torn targeting pod, broken radar radome and smashed nose wheel as a result.
About an hour later, the other pilot in the formation managed to land successfully on the same runway after burning off excess fuel.
E-006 was later recovered by a Chinook of C-Company, 159th Aviation Regiment from Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
The aircraft was then transported to Denmark and restored at the Main Workshop in Aalborg and returned to service in 2006.
November 2023, E-006 was selected to be the only second F-16 in the Air Force's history to be fully painted. As a successor to E-191 "Dannebrog 800", E-006 was completed on 6 June 2024 and flew its first flight as RDAF Half Century Fighting Falcon aka RDAF Viper 50 🇩🇰.