McDonnell Douglas F-15C Eagle
Object Details
- Date
- 1985
- Maker
- McDonnell Douglas
- Physical Description
- Complete aircraft. Gray aircraft with images on tail fins of man's face on interior sides and an eagle on exterior rear right fin. Nose of aircraft is darker gray, body is lighter gray.
- Summary
- The McDonnell Douglas F-15C Eagle is a U.S. Air Force air superiority, all-weather fighter aircraft. It was designed to excel in air-to-air combat due to its emphasis on maneuverability, as well as its long range AN/APG-63 radar. It is powered by the Pratt and Whitney F100-PW-220 afterburning turbofan engine, allowing it to reach a maximum speed of Mach 2.5. No F-15 Eagles have ever been lost in air-to-air combat to enemy action, and pilots flying F-15s have shot down more than 100 enemy aircraft.
- This F-15 is serial no. 85-0114, in which then-Captain Cesar “Rico” Rodriguez achieved two aerial victories against Iraqi MiG fighters during Operation Desert Storm, flying with the 58th Tactical Fighter Squadron (33rd Tactical Fighter Wing). The first victory was against a MiG-29 on January 19, 1991. The second victory, in the same aircraft, was on January 26, 1991, against a MiG-23.
- Long Description
- The F-15 Eagle is an American twin-engine, all-weather fighter aircraft designed by McDonnell Douglas (part of Boeing since 1997). The F-15 was the principal air superiority fighter of the USAF during the late Cold War and beyond. It was designed to excel in air-to-air combat due to its emphasis on maneuverability, as well as its long range AN/APG-63 radar.
- Development officially began in 1965, then called the F-X (Fighter Experimental) program, after figures in the Air Force and the defense industry advocated for a new fighter design that emphasized air-to-air combat and maneuverability. Design requirements were finalized in 1968, with four companies submitting proposals in 1969. The Air Force selected McDonnell Douglas’s design, and the first F-15 flew in July 1972. Eagles entered service in 1976. F-15C and -D models were retired in 2025 due primarily to structural fatigue due to aging. The ground attack variant -E model (“Strike Eagle,” first produced in 1985) is projected to continue to fly into the 2030s. A later derivative called “Advanced Eagle” was introduced in the 2010s, first as the F-15SA (produced for Saudi Arabia), and developed into the F-15EX and other variants, which first flew in 2021.
- The U.S. first used F-15s in combat operations during the 1983 invasion of Grenada, but the U.S. employed Eagles in a much more significant way in the Gulf War of 1991. In that war, American F-15C’s flew 5,685 sorties (Saudi Arabia flew F-15Cs in an additional 2,088 sorties). Of the 42 Iraqi aircraft defeated in air-to-air combat in that war, F-15Cs were responsible for 36 of those victories (about 86 percent, 34 by American pilots, 2 by Saudi pilots). In some cases, the F-15’s maneuverability was a decisive factor, but Eagle pilots had also developed new tactics to take advantage of the long-range radar and weapons systems of the aircraft. This included “target sorting,” by which a flight of four Eagles, using their long-range radar systems, could coordinate with each other to divide responsibility for attacking enemy aircraft in groups, locking and firing from long distances before a maneuvering battle could begin.
- The U.S. flew Eagles extensively in later conflicts, including those in Iraq, Bosnia, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. F-15s have also been used by Saudi Arabia, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Qatar, and Singapore. Across all the nations that have flown them, F-15s have shot down over 100 enemy aircraft (over half of these by Israel) and no Eagles have been lost in air-to-air combat due to enemy action.
- The Museum’s F-15 is serial no. 85-0114, in which then-Captain Cesar “Rico” Rodriguez achieved two aerial victories against Iraqi MiG fighters during Operation Desert Storm, flying with the 58th Tactical Fighter Squadron (33rd Tactical Fighter Wing). The first was a MiG-29 on January 19, 1991, in which Rodriguez forced the MiG into a close-turning dogfight and eventually forced the MiG to maneuver at such low altitude that it crashed into the ground. The second incident, in the same aircraft, was on January 26, 1991, in which Rodriguez and his three wingmen engaged a group of three MiG-23s. Rodriguez shot down one of them, and two of his wingmen destroyed the other two.
- Rodriguez later shot down another MiG-29 during Operation Allied Force in 1999, while flying a different F-15. This makes him one of only four Americans since 1972 to score three aerial victories, the closest that any American pilot has come to achieving “ace” status (five combat victories) since the Vietnam War.
- See more items in
- National Air and Space Museum Collection
- Location
- Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, VA
- Exhibit Station
- Modern Military Aviation
- Credit Line
- Transferred from the National Museum of the United States Air Force
- Data Source
- National Air and Space Museum
- Inventory Number
- A20260082000
- Type
- CRAFT-Aircraft
- Restrictions & Rights
- Usage conditions apply
- Materials
- Aluminum (37.3%); Titanium (25.8%); Steel (5.5%); Composites (Boron and
- Graphite, 1.2 %); Fiberglass (1%); the remainder other materials such as rubber,
- honeycomb, etc.
- Dimensions
- Large Object (Aircraft): 19.05m × 13.157m × 5.664m, 12473.9kg (62 ft. 6 in. × 43 ft. 2 in. × 18 ft. 7 in., 27500lb.)
- Record ID
- nasm_A20260082000
Complete aircraft. Gray aircraft with images on tail fins of man's face on interior sides and an eagle on exterior rear right fin. Nose of aircraft is darker gray, body is lighter gray.