Tagged: Draken
MY FAVOURITE AEROPLANE IN 200 WORDS #24 Saab 37 Viggen by Alice Dryden
Your friend is running an aviation role-playing game. You need a character and an aircraft, and you don’t want to be British or American because everyone else is.
You remember an airshow, early 1990s, you and your dad gazing at a silver fighter with unusual wings. You say: OK, my pilot is Swedish, his name’s Lars, and he flies a Saab Viggen.
The more you research your chosen plane, the more you’re smitten. It can take off and land on motorways! It’s technically a biplane! You build the 1:144 Revell kit; find the Matchbox model at a boot sale. You visit the Gothenburg Aeroseum and sit in that huge, high cockpit, in a Cold War hangar hacked from solid rock.
In 2012, the Swedish Air Force Historic Flight restore their Viggen to flying condition and announce a display at Sanicole Airshow in Belgium. On your birthday.
So on a sunny September Sunday you watch that silver fighter rise on the lift from its delta wing and canard foreplane, showing off its unique silhouette for you just like twenty years ago, and you learn that this particular Viggen was actually made in the year of your birth.
It’s your birthday Viggen.
Alice Dryden [http://www.alice.dryden.co.uk] appreciates well-built Scandinavians.
If you like Swedish aircraft, you’ll love this
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Hush-Kit Top Ten: The ten best-looking Swedish aeroplanes
Hur mår du? Outside of France and the superpowers, Sweden is the only nation that still produces her own fighter aircraft. From Gunnar ‘The Ghost’ to Elsa Andersson, Sweden’s aviators and aircraft have long been made of a special kind of magic. Their aeroplanes have often been technologically advanced, rivalling the best in the world, and it is only politics (and large price tags) which have stopped them being more widely exported (Allestädes framme får ofta näsbränna!).
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Here is an excuse to ogle at ten wonderful Swedish aeroplanes. If you enjoy this, have a look at the top ten British, French, Australian, Soviet and German aeroplanes. Wanting Something a little more exotic? Try the top ten fictional aircraft.
10. Saab 91 Safir
9. Saab 29 Tunnan
8. Svenska Aero Jaktfalken
7. FFVS 22
6. Saab 18
4. Saab 21R
3. Saab Lansen
2. Saab 37 Viggen
1. Saab 35 Draken
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Viggen love here
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If you enjoyed this, have a look at the top ten British, French, Australian, Soviet and German aeroplanes. Wanting Something a little more exotic? Try the top ten fictional aircraft.
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