PHANTOM FURY

Description

The biggest, fastest, most powerful fighter of its day, the McDonnell Phantom was an awesome war machine that came to dominate aerial combat for over two decades. It may have been the size of many World War II bombers but it could out-perform anything that crossed its path; The F-4 Phantom was the benchmark against which every fighter in the world came to be judged; it was simply the best.

When it saw combat for the first time, in Vietnam in 1961, it was the lucky Navi and Marine Corps pilots who were the first to fly it.  Whether it was carrier-based attacks with the Navy, land-based bombing missions with the Marines, air combat sorties, or Forward Air Control missions, it was unbeatable.  So impressed were the Air Force that they bought it too and, three years later in 1964, the USAF received their Phantoms.  The Air Force pilots couldn’t wait to get their hands on it.

One of those itching to take the Phantom into combat was a young, then Captain, Steve Ritchie.  Flying with the 555th Tactical Fighter Squadron, the illustrious “Triple Nickel,” Ritchie would, in the space of a few weeks during Operation Linebacker in the summer of 1972 become a legend – the only USAF fighter pilot Ace of the Vietnam War.

Robert Taylor’s powerful painting depicts Steve Ritchie, first into action, flying his lead F-4D Phantom through a hail of deadly enemy flak as he exits the target area after a typical FAST FAC mission on enemy installations in North Vietnam, 1972. Behind him a vast trail of devastation marks the mission’s progress, as his fellow Phantom crews continue to wreak havoc with their heavy ordnance, the target area exploding in a series of mighty detonations.

This outstanding masterpiece is the long awaited third and final ‘follow up’ to Robert’s previous editions, Phantom Strike and Phantom Showtime.