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| (Image credit : Leonid Faerberg / Wiki Common) |
The Strizhi (Swifts) is an aerobatic demonstrator team of the Russian Air Force, formed on 6 May 1991. The team currently performs with 6 MiG-29A and MiG-29UB aircraft.
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| (Image credit : Dmitry Terekhov / Wiki Common) |
The team also routinely uses just four aircraft for demonstrations, but also flies with fewer numbers and / or larger numbers by combining formations with the "Russian Knights".
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| (Image credit : Konstantin von Wedelstaedt / Wiki Common) |
The team's aircraft are painted in an overall white, red and blue color scheme and do not employ smoke generators.
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| (Image credit : Papas Dos / Wiki Common) |
All team members are drawn from the 237th Guards Proskurov Aircraft Demonstration Centre based in Kubinka Air Base. Like the "Russian Knights", the pilots and ground crew on the team are variable and don't have to practice extensively like other aerobatic teams to change their members for a period. The team's pilots permanent duty is also fighter training.
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| (Image credit : Konstantin von Wedelstaedt / Wiki Common) |
The group’s official birthday is May 6, 1991, when it first performed at an air show called Strizhi.
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| (Image credit : Dmitry Terekhov / Wiki Common) |
In October 1991, Strizhi also performed for the first time abroad at the Uppsala airbase in Sweden, and in May 1992 a group of 6 MiG-29s impressed their French spectators with their skill at a holiday dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the Normandie-Niemen squadron.
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| (Image credit : Dmitry A. Mottl / Wiki Common) |
In the following years, Strizhi represented the aviation of Russia with dignity in Malaysia, Belgium, Thailand, Hungary, Holland, Bulgaria, the USA, Vietnam, China, Mongolia, Germany, Kazakhstan, the Czech Republic, the United Arab Emirates.
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| (Image credit : Leonid Faerberg / Wiki Common) |
In 1993, Strizhi aerobatic team was awarded the title of "The best aerobatic team in the world".
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| (Image credit : Parfaits / Wiki Common) |
At the moment, Strizhi aerobatic team during air shows demonstrates its updated program, which opens single-player aerobatics in extreme flight mode and continues group aerobatics consisting of 6 crews.
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| (Image credit : Aleksandr Markin / Wiki Common) |
The Mikoyan MiG-29 (NATO reporting name: "Fulcrum") is a twin-engine jet fighter aircraft designed in the Soviet Union. Developed by the Mikoyan design bureau as an air superiority fighter during the 1970s, the MiG-29, along with the larger
Sukhoi Su-27, was developed to counter new American fighters such as the
McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle, and the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon. The MiG-29 entered service with the Soviet Air Force in 1982.
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