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This Vietnam era sales film for the McDonnell Douglas A4 Skyhawk shows the versatile aircraft's development and unique characteristics. The late model A4F is seen. This was a refinement of A4E with extra avionics housed in a hump on the fuselage spine (this feature later retrofitted to A4Es and some A4Cs) and more powerful J52P8A engine with 9,300 lbf (41 kN) of thrust, later upgraded in service to J52P408 with 11,200 lbf (50 kN), 147 built. Some served with Blue Angels acrobatic team from 1973 to 1986. The film shows the A4M at the 4 minute mark; but at the time of the film's release it may have not yet been in production.

The Douglas A4 Skyhawk is a single seat carriercapable attack aircraft developed for the United States Navy and United States Marine Corps. The delta winged, singleengined Skyhawk was designed and produced by Douglas Aircraft Company, and later by McDonnell Douglas. It was originally designated A4D under the U.S. Navy's pre1962 designation system.

The Skyhawk is a lightweight aircraft with a maximum takeoff weight of 24,500 pounds (11,100 kg) and has a top speed of more than 600 miles per hour (970 km/h). The aircraft's five hardpoints support a variety of missiles, bombs and other munitions and were capable of delivering nuclear weapons using a low altitude bombing system and a "loft" delivery technique. The A4 was originally powered by the Wright J65 turbojet engine; from the A4E onwards, the Pratt & Whitney J52 was used.

Skyhawks played key roles in the Vietnam War, the Yom Kippur War, and the Falklands War. Sixty years after the aircraft's first flight, some of the nearly 3,000 produced remain in service with several air arms around the world, including from the Brazilian Navy's aircraft carrier, São Paulo.

The Skyhawk remained in production until 1979, with 2,960 aircraft built, including 555 twoseat trainers. The last production A4, an A4M of Marine squadron (VMA331) had the flags of all nations that operated the A4 painted on its fuselage sides.

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com