{"id":57855,"date":"2024-06-02T06:14:12","date_gmt":"2024-06-01T20:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/usaf-qf-16-program-explained-turns-f-16s-drones-blows-them-up\/"},"modified":"2024-06-02T06:14:12","modified_gmt":"2024-06-01T20:14:12","slug":"qf-16-program-explained-why-the-usaf-turns-f-16s-into-drones-then-blows-them-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/?p=57855","title":{"rendered":"QF-16 Program Explained: Why The USAF Turns F-16s Into Drones Then Blows Them Up"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>            The <a href=\"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/f-16s-arrive-in-ukraine-combat-record\/\">F-16 Fighting Falcon has a stunning record in aerial combat<\/a> (with one confirmed air-to-air loss). But it turns out many more F-16s have been shot out of the sky, and it&#8217;s the United States that&#8217;s been doing the shooting. One of a <a href=\"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/what-happens-military-aircraft-after-retirement\/\">number of fates that can await retired military aircraft<\/a> (and one fate for many <a href=\"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/tag\/f-16\/\">F-16s<\/a>) is for the <a href=\"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/tag\/us-air-force\/\">US Air Force<\/a> to blow them out of the sky as part of the QF Aerial Target <a href=\"https:\/\/simpleflying.com\/tag\/drones\/\">drone<\/a> program (or the new VENOM project). These zombie Vipers are used for many test missions and pilot training. They can be excellent test beds for developing next-generation technology.    <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>F-16s are advanced 4th-generation fighters that can serve several roles as zombie drones after they retire (including as Aerial Targets).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[396,6388,625,412,1328],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aircraft","category-drone","category-f-16","category-military","category-united-states-air-force"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=57855"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57856,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57855\/revisions\/57856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vibewire.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}