Krila Oluje
Country
Croatia
Size
4 to 6 Aircraft
Base
Zemunik Air Base
The Wings of Storm (Krila Oluje in Croatian) is a national aerobatic team of Croatia and consists of six instructor pilots from the 93rd Military airbase in Zemunik flying six Pilatus PC-9M turboprop training aircraft. Captain Diana Dobos, who was a member of 'Krila Oluje' from 2005 to 2007 became the third woman in the world to fly in an aerobatic team.
The team performed its first display with four aircraft on the 22nd of July 2004 at the opening ceremony of European sailing championships in Zadar. Just a year later, on August 5th, 2005 the team took part in the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the military and police operation known as 'Oluja', after their impressive display the team has received the name Krila Oluja. By the end of the year, the team grew by an additional aircraft, and another in 2009. The team performed their first display as a six-ship formation on the 25th of March 2009.
Krila Oluje performs a very challenging 23-minute display routine with impressive manoeuvres that include formation tailslides and formation spins. During their display, the aircraft fly less than 2 m apart from each other, at speeds of up to 550 km/h and the G-loads that the pilots endure are from -2.5 g to +6.5 g.
On March 4th, 2015, all six pilots submitted their request to end their military service and leave the Air Force, thus effectively disbanding the Wings of Storm a few months before their tenth anniversary. According to several media, the pilots received a superior offer from Qatar, where they would be flying the more advanced PC-21.
The team has been reformed with new pilots in 2015 and continues to fly displays to this day. The new team performed their debut display at RIAT 2016 the worlds largest military airshow and won "King Hussein Memorial Sword" for the best overall flying demonstration and at SIAF 2017 has been awarded for the most precise flying demonstration.
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Signature Formations
Delta Six
Rocket six
Triple mirror
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Pilatus PC-9M
The Pilatus PC-9 is a single-engine, low-wing tandem-seat turboprop training aircraft manufactured by Pilatus Aircraft of Switzerland. Designed as a more powerful evolution of the Pilatus PC-7, the PC-9's first flight was made in May 1984 after which certification was achieved in September 1985. After this, the first production orders for the type were received from the Royal Saudi Air Force, with deliveries commencing in 1985. Since then, more than 250 airframes have been produced across five different variants and the type is employed by a number of military and civilian operators around the world, including the Swiss Air Force, the Croatian Air Force, and the Royal Thai Air Force.
The PC-9 is a more powerful evolution of the PC-7. It retains the overall layout of its predecessor, but it has very little structural commonality with it. Amongst other improvements, the PC-9 features a larger cockpit with stepped ejection seats and also has a ventral airbrake.
The PC-9 program officially started in 1982. Although some aerodynamic elements were tested on a PC-7 during 1982 and 1983, the first flight of the first PC-9 prototype took place on 7 May 1984. A second prototype flew on the 20th of July the same year; this prototype had all the standard electronic flight instrumentation and environmental control systems installed and was thus almost fully representative of the production version. The certification was achieved in September 1985. By this time, the PC-9 had lost the Royal Air Force trainer competition to the Short Tucano. However, the marketing links that Pilatus built up with British Aerospace during the competition led to their first order from Saudi Arabia. As of 2004, more than 250 aircraft of this type have been built.
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