F-15E LANTIRN vs LITENING

[FrancLEsc]

Hi

I was wondering which pod, AN/AAQ-28 LITENING or AN/AAQ-14 LANTIRN, to use with the following F-15Es:

1. Any of the F-15Es featured in Twobobs Mountain Home avengers sheet from 391FS during OEF

2. F-15E from 336FS “Mighty Mouse†during OIF

Thanks in advance.

[Lock n' Load]

I think the F-15 carried those togheter, and rarely carried only one.

In combat i mean.

[jmel]

Use the -14 for OEF. A few jets used the LITENING during the beginning phases of OIF, but just a few. I believe it mostly was the 335th that used it.

Jake

[Dave Williams]

I think the F-15 carried those togheter, and rarely carried only one.

In combat i mean.

Both the LITENING and AAQ-14 LANTRIN pod are targeting pods and I believe it would be a case of one or the other, not both. Either might be carried in conjunction with the AAQ-13 Navigation pod.

[Lock n' Load]

True True, it was the navigation pod!

[Qian]

Gee, I've never seen any F-15E carrying the LITENING pod before. As far as I know, F-15Es can carry either the Sniper XR or AAQ-14 LANTIRN targeting pod together with the LANTIRN nav pod.

[strikeeagle801]

LITENING was used for a very short while on the F-15E as an interim measure between LANTIRN and SNIPER. It was not flown much, and as Jake said, all I can find about it is that it was flown by the 335th and possible the 336th. So to answer the questions, I'd go with LANTIRN on both the Avengers and 336th jets.

Aaron

EDIT: I found my Osprey F-15E Strike Eagle Units in Combat book, and it says that the 335th and 336th did indeed fly with the LITENING pod during their first OIF deployment, so depending on when the nose art was carried, it may be appropriate to put a LITENING pod on the 336th jet. I say may because of the fact that there was only 18 or so pods in country, and according to the book, only about 6-9 of them actually worked at any given time! So if the nose art was applied during the first deployment, you'd be safe with a LITENING, and unless someone's got a picture of that particular jet that says otherwise, no one would be able to say you were wrong.

Mountain Home, however, would've still been using the LANTIRN pod during the onset of OEF (when they carried the nose art on the Avengers sheet).

Edited August 23, 2009 by strikeeagle801

[FrancLEsc]

Thank you all for your help.

I have been trying to look for pictures of that F-15E with the Mighty Mouse art online, but all I got were pictures of the nose art itself and not the entire aircraft. It seems that this particular artwork was carried sometime during 2003.