Adieu MiG-21 Fishbed!

[Rakesh]

With the last two of the MiG-21 squadrons (No 3 Cobras and No 23 Panthers) retiring by 2025, it is a watershed moment for the Indian Air Force.

Just like the wonderful MiG-27 thread on BRF (viewtopic.php?t=7787), starting this thread to document her tenure with the IAF; with articles, photographs and videos. This thread will serve as a tribute to the hundreds (perhaps a few thousand ?) of IAF pilots that flew her since her entry into IAF service in 1963 and to the many pilots that unfortunately died while flying her. The IAF pilots who died - in peacetime and in war - while flying the MiG-21, are now on eternal patrol.

The Fishbed - known in the IAF as Vikram, Trishul, Mongol and Bison in multiple variants - will go down in history as having the unique honour of shooting down a fourth generation fighter, the much respected Lockheed Martin F-16 of the Pakistan Air Force. A testament to not just the aircraft herself, but the dogged determination and aggressiveness of the IAF pilot (Group Captain Abhinandan Varthaman, VrC) who flew her on that day. Two words that still haunt the Pakistan Air Force to this day ---> "R-73 Selected!" The thread - documenting that unique air battle - is still active on BRF ---> viewtopic.php?t=7699

But the legacy of the MiG-21 will never die in the IAF. Her soul will continue to live on, in an infinitely more capable aircraft - India's very own Tejas Mk1A - that is set to take over the precious mantle of protecting India's vast airspace. And if planes could speak to each other, the retiring MiG-21 Bison would say this to the incoming Tejas Mk1A --->

'नभ: स्पृशं दीप्तम्' / Nabhah Sparsham Deeptam / Touch The Sky With Glory!

There is no aircraft - anywhere in the world or even to come - than the Tejas Mk1A, that would be better suited to replace the wonderful and rich legacy of the MiG-21 in the Indian Air Force. The Tejas Mk1A is a fitting tribute and a more than capable successor to the iconic MiG-21 that protected India's airspace for more than six decades. Wishing the Tejas much success in service with the Indian Air Force. Keeping my fingers crossed and wishing/hoping that the first Tejas Mk1A squadron to be raised - in the Indian Air Force - will be No 51 Sword Arms and be stationed at Srinagar Air Force Station, in the air defence of the Srinagar Valley.

तेजस तेजस्वी नमः / Tejas Tejaswi Namaham / I am the Glory of the Glorious!

P.S. In due course, this thread (and the MiG-27 one) will move to the Military History archive for future reference.

[Rakesh]

MiG-21 in the Indian Skies: Evolution of IAF’s Iconic Jet
https://iafhistory.in/2022/03/08/iaf-mi ... n-history/
By Anchit Gupta

MIG-21 – THE IAF’S MAINSTAY FOR SEVERAL DECADES
https://www.sps-aviation.com/story/?id= ... 1-andndash
By Joseph Noronha

MiG-21 Variants Listed by Strength/Numbers
https://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Data ... p?qacid=50
By PVS Jagan Mohan

[Rakesh]

https://x.com/AnchitGupta9/status/17199 ... 11372?s=20 ---> As the MiG-21 of Oorials (No 4 Sqn) make their final descent, three of my cherished photographers have captured captivating images. Sometimes, photographers convey the essence more eloquently than words.

[Rakesh]

https://x.com/hvtiaf/status/1720120745924456676?s=20 ---> Beauty and the Beast

[Rakesh]

VIDEO: https://x.com/AviationWall/status/17203 ... 56837?s=20 ---> The LEGEND. But it was time for farewell.

[Rakesh]

Flying & Fighting in the MiG-21: Interview with Group Captain MJA Vinod
https://hushkit.net/2019/10/29/flying-f ... mja-vinod/
By Group Captain MJA Vinod (retd)

[Rakesh]

THE LOUDEST TAKEOFF EVER | MiG-21 Bison | Indian Air Force

[Rakesh]

MiG-21: The Invincible Multi-Role Aircraft | Indiatimes | Frontlines S02E04

[Rakesh]

Deadly MiG-21 Indian Air Force | 4K

[Rakesh]

Indian Air Force MiG-21| LOW LEVEL PASS

[Rakesh]

NO HEADPHONES-SUPER LOUD |
Indian Air Force MiG-21 SCRAMBLES

[Rakesh]

Indian Air Force MiG-21 Trainer | RARE FOOTAGE

[Rakesh]

What an absolutely fantastic tweet...

https://x.com/AnchitGupta9/status/17206 ... 29657?s=20 ---> For 60 years, the MiG-21 has served in the @IAF_MCC, while its phase-out journey has spanned 40 years. This summary highlights how, over four decades, 28 units of the IAF transitioned out from the MiG-21 - an incredibly arduous task to replace a mainstay.

Key insights:

1. The Indian Air Force operated 24 Fighter Squadrons and 4 Training Units equipped with the MiG-21.

2. Throughout service in these 28 establishments, the average tenure of the MiG-21 aircraft was 33 years.

3. The transition to the MiG-21 began with the 28 Squadron in 1963, and the 20 Squadron was the last (albeit briefly) in the late 1990s.

4. During the 1980s, only four Squadrons switched from the MiG-21, with two converting to the Mirage 2000 and two to the MiG-29.

5. No 4 Squadron holds the distinction of serving the longest with the MiG-21 for nearly 58 years. If 3 Squadron continues its service until 2025, it will be the second-longest-serving unit at 53 years.

6. Five IAF Squadrons exclusively operated the M variant of the MiG-21 for an average duration of 40 years each. These Squadrons were Nos 17, 35, 37, 101 and 108.

7. The FL (Type-77) variant was preferred by training units and Type Training Squadrons.

8. The Tactics and Air Combat Development Establishment (TACDE) had the honour of operating four different variants of the MiG-21, excluding the trainer types.

Sources for these insights include Form 1500 from the Ministry of Defence History Division, Bharat Rakshak, books by Pushpinder Singh, the CAW History series, Squadron coffee table books, Press Information Bureau releases, and accounts from veterans.

Graphic by @SauravChordia1 and background image by @zone5aviation

Every effort has been diligently undertaken to ensure the accuracy of this information, and any unintentional errors are sincerely regretted.

[aharam]

It has been a while, and this is not an occasion I can miss. Farewell to the old bird - it is genuinely the end of an era that was maintained by upgrades to ensure survivability in modern battlefields. She was the last of the maneuverable pilot, flown aircraft, where as the pilot, you had the least electronics and safeties between you, the controls, and the aircraft. She was quickly just an extension of your body - like a motorcycle you can push and mechanical (in our case hydraulic) systems giving you direct feedback. I mostly flew the Bis. There was a flight envelope, and as the pilot you got a finger feel for when she would flutter to indicate deviation - now these are much safer FBW control laws that can't feel the control surfaces that is way beyond their notion of safety. It was an unforgiving flight envelope though, this was an aircraft that you flew, as in you spent most of your focus and flew till every vibration was second nature. It has a lot of mistakes you can make that are quickly deadly.


She was an interceptor through and through - climb to 60K was careful husbanding of fuel burn; afterburner and hold by time at IAS at each altitude level - climb was a stairstep. Once you understood the aircraft, you always fought on a dive - she was an interceptor, and in a dive attacking, all directional/altitudinal changes by the prey are quite easily countered by little deflection of much higher airspeed diving aircraft that can actually use her deltas. If you miss, yoyo back to altitude with your much higher dive airspeed and repeat. In the years since I left, I met a Finnish Mig-21F pilot - he hated it for its landing attitude, but loved it for being able to feel it directly. I have had the same experience subsequently with manual cars vs stability management systems in fast cars.

Cheers
Aharam

[Rakesh]

Another MiG-21 Squadron Retired: The Curtain Is Closing on IAF's Most Abiding Fighter
https://thewire.in/security/mig-21-squa ... ng-fighter
01 Nov 2023

[Cyrano]

Thanks for posting Aharam ji.

Please do share more stories when possible.

[Rakesh]

https://x.com/officialTatya_1/status/17 ... 18586?s=20 ---> MiG-21s of Indian Air Force. (Feel free to correct/add info).

[Rakesh]

Meet the new warbird in the National Capital !

https://x.com/dipalay/status/1731320494014832729?s=20 ----> The retired IAF MiG-21 Type 96 with tail number C1492, recently got installed at The Rashtrapati Bhavan Museum in New Delhi. C1492 participated as a static display in the Republic Day parade in late 1970s.

[Rakesh]

Meet the new warbird in the National Capital !

https://x.com/dipalay/status/1731320494014832729?s=20 ----> The retired IAF MiG-21 Type 96 with tail number C1492, recently got installed at The Rashtrapati Bhavan Museum in New Delhi. C1492 participated as a static display in the Republic Day parade in late 1970s.

https://x.com/singhshwetabh71/status/17 ... 37812?s=20 ---> C1492 when it was in Delhi Republic Day 1978. A Type 96 MF.

[RCase]

Koraput Division made the engines that powered the MIG 21 and above one is displayed at Sunabeda. This factory was located in a remote part of the country and did not have rail/ air connectivity. Most people who lived there had to take a rickety Orissa State Transport bus from Vishakapatnam (120 km)/ Vijaynagaram (only 3 times a day) that would wind through the eastern ghats for hours on end. Sometimes one had to stand for a good stretch of the journey or sit on the engine case of the bus! In the 60's and 70's you could expect a newspaper after 2 - 3 days to know what was going on in the world.

Neverwho in his brilliance and political appeasement, setup an aircraft engine unit in this place. The engines had to be transported from Sunabeda to Jagadalpur (Chattisgarh) by truck via winding roads and later loaded on railway to be transported to Nashik and mated to the airframe. Talk about lack of infrastructure! One wonders how the supply chain would work in times of a war.

[Kersi]

Any Tribute to this gallnat lady would be incomplete without mentioning her compatriots.

MiG 21 was regularly compared, often unjustly, with others like F 104 Starfighter, F 4 Phantom, Mirage III series, EE / BAC Lightening, F 102, F 106 etc.

Where are they now ?

The MiG21 will fly for a few more months but the others have flown into oblivion a long time ago, probably years ago.

Adieu thy fair lady

[Kersi]

What will happen to the aircrafts after they are retired from service?

Scrap yard ? NO PLEASE.

I hope the IAF/MOD generously distributes the airframes to various IAF and defence establishments, to the academic institutions, and places of public interests.

[Rakesh]

MiG-21 and gender integration through eyes of women pilots
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-ne ... 61199.html
08 Dec 2023

[Rakesh]

Time for the MiG-21 to fade into history, albeit with fond memories, ace pilots say with pride
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-ne ... 62160.html
11 Dec 2023

[Rakesh]

From the Jan 2024 edition of Vayu Aerospace. Article starts from Page 60. Please click on link below....

IAF’s No. 3 Squadron prepares for bittersweet farewell to MiG–21
https://www.vayuaerospace.in/Issue/2024 ... 151624.pdf
By Rahul Singh

[Rakesh]

VIDEO: https://x.com/ChungTzuW/status/1834142625533763721 ---> India's first MiG-21M.

[Rakesh]

MiG-21 phase-out delayed due to production challenges for Tejas jets: Sources
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/m ... 2024-12-04
04 Dec 2024

[AkshaySG]

MiG-21 phase-out delayed due to production challenges for Tejas jets: Sources
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/m ... 2024-12-04
04 Dec 2024

Collective failure at all levels of IAF, MOD and HAL.

Forget Mk1A, then Mk1 was good enough to replace all Mig21s and then some but we decided to put in a piecemeal order.

[fanne]

The most possible and obvious and common sense solution is staring at us, but we won't take it. It takes care of any US perfidy, or cost or delay in foreign production line or obsoleteness etc etc.

[ramana]

IAF is the unwilling horse that doesn't want the Tejas.
The 40 were ordered as a token qty as country had spent lot of money and effort to develop it.

Then came Mk1A orders. As usual requirements creep made the newer engine necessary.

The IAF was happy with over 800 Mig 21 and crashed over 470 of them.
Yet they wanted Mk1A and MK2 as replacements.

[RCase]

Isn't it ironic that HAL/ MOD/ IAF still don't have the vision to build an airstrip to land IAF aircraft (especially heavy lift cargo) at Koraput/ Sunabeda,where the engines are manufactured. The MIG 21 has been manufactured since the 60's. The Su-30 engines are now being manufactured there. Same old rickety infrastructure.

[Aditya_V]

Even CAS , many IAF Aircraft for a long time show their spines to Sun and weather, wind, while almost all PAF bases have hardened dispersed concrete shelters.

[sajaym]

OT...but I wanted to mention here that those who are die hard fans of the MIG-21 can try their hands on an android game called 'GUNSHIP III Air Combat Simulation' (download the version of the game with the picture of Mig-21). It's THE best Mig-21 simulation you can find in a mobile phone game. It's set in the Vietnam War period and you have the choice of flying two variants - Mig-21 PFM and MIG-21 M. The game has realistic flight model and terrain and awesome game play allowing you to start up from hangar and taxi to runway for take-off. And you have the freedom to do not follow any set scripts or mission. In fact, most of the time I just practice aerobatics over the runway. This game is nearly 10 years old and it's amazing how it's still far superior to the IAF game released a few years back.

[fanne]

I was hinting on more su30mki updated with latest greatest avionics (lca is good if and when they come). It is the plane that we make with highest % of indigenous content. The upgrades (mostly avionics) can be 100% Indian. We can spend extra to indigenize what is not yet (these planes are there for another 20 years, we better). Build another 100 extra, yes we will be top heavy, but it answers all our issues (except lo). It will also be hard on opex (only slightly). One su30mki 5th gen can replace 5-7 mig 21 or 2-3 lca. Or perhaps be as good as Rafale (it will never be because of lack of lo and other design deficiencies vis a vis a near a 5th gen fighter). But 100 can arrest a rapid decline in numbers till we parallely figure out how to clean issues regarding lca 1, 2, amca, more rafale etc.
And we can perhaps start right away making 12-20 of these

[ernest]

I was hinting on more su30mki updated with latest greatest avionics (lca is good if and when they come). It is the plane that we make with highest % of indigenous content. The upgrades (mostly avionics) can be 100% Indian. We can spend extra to indigenize what is not yet (these planes are there for another 20 years, we better). Build another 100 extra, yes we will be top heavy, but it answers all our issues (except lo). It will also be hard on opex (only slightly). One su30mki 5th gen can replace 5-7 mig 21 or 2-3 lca. Or perhaps be as good as Rafale (it will never be because of lack of lo and other design deficiencies vis a vis a near a 5th gen fighter). But 100 can arrest a rapid decline in numbers till we parallely figure out how to clean issues regarding lca 1, 2, amca, more rafale etc.
And we can perhaps start right away making 12-20 of these

To add to that, the costs can be offset by using our infra to service other Flanker operators. Maybe we can also sell them second hand to some of these, when we have AMCA/ORCA/TejasMk2 lines humming at high production rates.

There has been no dearth of practical solutions in any of the past years. It is the rigidity of decision making that has landed us in this soup. We could have had larger Tejas fleet, with perhaps Kaveri if we were practical in our decision making. Instead we have the MMRCA/MRFA tender checking off boxes for decades.

[Cain Marko]

A part of me always hoped for a fishbed upgrade with fulcrum Rd 33mk engines, bison MK2 .. Now that would've been an absolute rocket.

[Rishi]

Chandigarh IAF Hertiage center has a MiG 21 and a full cockpit ex CAE cockpit i guess used for training. The feeling of sitting in that seat is incredible

[Rishi]

This is the MiG21 warbird at the enterence