DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (UAE) – The past years we were often amazed on YouTube by all the mind-blowing maneuvers of Russian fighter jets at the MAKS Airshow in Russia, performed by amazing and high maneuverable fighter jets like the Su-30, Su35, Su-37 and Su-57, with their thrust-vectoring engines. Well, the star of the 2019 edition of the Dubai Airshow in the UAE – the F-22 – can perform all those maneuvers too. The USAF F-22 Demo Team performed an exhilirating demo and showed to the world what this awesome 5th Gen fighter jet is capable of, as you can watch in the next videos!

The past years people in the U.S. and Europe were often wondering what 5th Gen fighter jets like the F-22 and F-35 are really capable of, when talking about maneuverability in relation to dogfights. Although the need for dogfights has changed nowadays with the F-22 and especially the F-35, a flying computer with a powerful radar and amazing systems. People still wonder though if they have any chance in dogfights against the highly-maneuverable Russian fighters.

If you search well enough on YouTube, you will find videos of F-22 demos with awesome maneuvers that only a few Russian fighter jets can perform, like the Cobra, High Alpha Loop and Pedal Turn (Flat Spin), High Alpha Slow Pass, and the Kulbit maneuver.

The F-22 also has thrust-vectoring engines like the latest Russian Sukhoi fighters and it also can perform these maneuvers, where the F-35 – without thrust-vectoring engines – has only performed the High Alpha Loop and Pedal Turn so far (for the first time at the Paris Airshow 2017).

By watching USAF Lt. Col. Paul Lopez’ (F-22 Raptor Demo Team commander) demo at the 2019 Dubai Airshow, it’s clear once and for all that the Russians are not the only ones who can perform these dazzling maneuvers.

Let’s hope the USAF F-35 Demo Team will show us what the F-35 is really capable of (in dogfights) during the coming years at airshows around the world, when new software upgrades will be implemented in the 5th Gen stealth fighter jet.

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(Head image: USAF / Staff Sgt. Joseph Pick)