Glad i made some reservations concerning my memory…
Here are the Yak-27 and Yak-28 survivors after the Soviets left.
There were more around, but those were scrapped at the big Rangsdorf metal-butchery in 1992 and mostly came from the Colbitz-ranges.

From Lutz Freundt:

Yak-27R 0214/35r – Preserved Werneuchen until 1993, to Diepensee until 1999, to France.

Photo by Siete Meeter as it was at Werneuchen

Yak-27R 0616/24r – Preserved Rangsdorf until 1993 as ’88r’, scrapped Rangsdorf 1994
Yak-27R 0708/28r – Preserved Wünsdorf-Zossen until 1993, to museum Dessau

Yak-28I 6941607/22r – Preserved Werneuchen until 1993, scrapped there Aug93. This is the green one i referred to above, so it did not survive (even though it was in great shape).
Yak-28R 8961310/25r – Derelict Altenburg until 1991, fixed up and sold to Veltheim (Porta Westfalica, West Germany)), now at Finow-Eberswalde musem.

Unfortunately I haven’t found which one of those now actually was the crash-memorial-Yak, nevertheless 35r still is the one i’m most inclined to – also because the owner at Diepensee was one of the people i learned the story from, and said 35 was the one. The real aircraft was definately a Yak-28I from the 207 IBAP, back then based at Finow-Eberswalde but now a Su-24 unit at Komsomolsk-na-Amure… a little bit further to the East.

A nice and utterly useless rundown of subvariants for the C-135 series which either exist or have existed… excluding specifying individual modifications like the various NKC-135s or the C-135C Speckled Trout, but with later variants made from modified earlier breeds of Stratotankers.

C-135A, C-135B, C-135C, C-135E, C-135F, C-135FR, C-135N

EC-135A, EC-135B-ARIA, EC-135C, EC-135E, EC-135G, EC-135H, EC-135J, EC-135K, EC-135L, EC-135N, EC-135P, EC-135Y,

KC-135A, KC-135B, KC-135D, KC-135E, KC-135Q, KC-135R, KC-135T, JKC-135A, NKC-135A, NKC-135E, VKC-135A, VKC-135B

NC-135A, NC-135W

RC-135A, RC-135B, RC-135C, RC-135D, RC-135E, RC-135M, RC-135S, RC-135T, RC-135U, RC-135V, RC-135W, RC-135X

OC-135B

TC-135B, TC-135S, TC-135W

VC-135A, VC-135B

WC-135B, WC-135C, WC-135W

Fun huh? That is 65 different designations to sort out the subvariant, but to make things easier sometimes two designations cover one subvariant (like the VKC-135A being the same as the VC-135A), and in other cases one designation refers to different subvariants (the NKC-135 series obviously, but there are also two different kinds of KC-135R…) Making sense out of this is one of my ongoing things-to-do, but it tends to get a little confusing every now and then.

The aircraft crashed was most definately a Yak-28 Brewer, most likely a Yak-28B with an Initsiativa-bombing radar. Back in 1966, these Brewers were based at Finow-Eberswalde, Werneuchen and Briesen, the crashed one being based at Finow. Yak-28P Firebar interceptors (with solid nosecones with an Oryol-radar) only served in East Germany on a deployment basis. Besides, if the aircraft was a Firebar the second guy could have survived the crash: in the interceptors, he sat behind the pilot so an ejection would have been possible. The pic of the salvaged tail shows it’s definately a -28, i won’t tell why just yet because it’s going to be an upcoming quiz question 😀

As said, my memory somehow states that the Diepensee Yak-27R was originally put up as a monument for the crew of the Yak-28 at the Soviet Forces in Germany HQ at Wunstorf-Zossen (there was a small museum with a few aircraft there), but we all know memories can do a lot of odd things. But so can Russians.

Steve, the Yak-28 now at the Finow museum is one of the two Yak-28s which were preserved at Werneuchen. One of them, the silver one, has been scrapped pretty shortly after the Soviet withdrawal, whereas the surviving one is the green one which used to be preserved inside one of the hangars. It is definately not the Havelsee/Stossensee (both names are used for the lake in which the Brewer crashed) memorial aircraft.

The C-135 series are not B707s. The MDS names for the 707 are C-137, C-18 and E-3. Although they look very much alike, the C-135 and 707 are completely different designs. A variant rundown of the 707 and C-135 series is a pretty endless list, if you’re interested in this matter i suggest finding some books or large articles since this is definately not something easily typed down in a digestable post here.

As for the reason the C-135/707 series have found so many military roles: they were cheap, plentiful, and fast enough to use as a tanker for fast jets.

The Yak-28’s crew of two did not eject because the pilot had to steer the aircraft into the lake to avoid crashing into a residential area. Because the navigator/bombardeer in a Brewer sits in the nose in front of the cockpit, it wouldn’t have been possible for the front-guy to eject on his own either. In honour of these blokes (besides some posthumus medals), a Yak was put up as a memorial with the bort number representing the crashed Brewer. I haven’t got my references at hand and i might well be confused, but i believe the monument was actually the Yak-27R bort 35(r) which now is at Diepensee.

Here are some pictures of the salvaging operation, from http://berlinerphil.tripod.com/berkyle.htm . The first pic shows some Soviet officers having a look at the work going on…

Originally posted by DeepSpace
BTW, the number ‘253’ isn’t the real tail-number, it’s just the number of one of the squadrons that the F-16I’s are going to.

Interesting. Would that mean 253 Tayaset (Ramon AFB, now F-16A/B) is the first one to recieve the new hunchback-F-16s? It would fit nicely though, as the F-16A/Bs should be cascading to current A-4 units to take over the operational and combat training task. Funnily enough, the other squadron to recieve the IF-16 is 107 Tayaset which is an already disbanded recce-Phantom unit from Hatzerim. It would mean the ‘new’ 107 would be retasked though, as i believe the recce role in the IDF/AF is (to be, or by now) taken over by pod-equipped F-15s (no, that is a 5 and not a typo) – which actually does make sense if you remember that one of the bonuses of the RF-4E and F-4E(S) is their low-level speed. I’m not sure about it yet, but it would surely be nice to see some Peek Eagles somewhere. And don’t forget that a recce-pod equipped F-15D (82-046) flew two test flights in 1995.

As per f-16.net, here is the rundown of current IF-16 serials. First the manufacturer’s serial (or c/n), then the FMS-serial (aka USAF-serial), then the to-be IDF/AF serial, and finally the unit to recieve it.

YD-001 00-1001 401 Test Sqd
YD-002 00-1002 403 253Tay.
YD-003 00-1003 404 253Tay.
YD-004 00-1004 253 253Tay.
YD-005 00-1005 407 253Tay.

Anyone knows how the Tzufas are going to be delivered? I wouldn’t mind deliveries via Ramstein again.

Oh, and the F-16 is an ugly and totally boring aircraft. Bumps, humps, pimples and a decent paintjob only alleviate that.

Back in 2001, i spotted at least two production Ka-50s (with those typically long thirteen-digit 35xxxxxxxxxxx construction numbers from the Arsenyev plant) at the Kamov test site at Lyubertsy as well. They could well be from the Torzhok-centre (Torzhok is to the helo aviation what Lipetsk is to the former FA and Savastleyka to the former PVO) as well though, since it was during MAKS – even though i think neither actually visited MAKS.