First time I saw this movie was on betamax! lol, i was a middle schooler and absolutely in love with the tomcat.. so much so that when I left high school I went in to the navy as an AZ, in an F-14 squadron during the first Persian gulf war. VF-74 Bedevilers out of oceana VA. good times!
I flew with Fox on my 5th flight in the F-14 back in 1984. He was the skipper of the RAG (Replacement Air Group) at Miramar. Since the movie was my motivator to join the Navy and try to earn my "wings of gold", Fox was kinda a special guy. After we completed our briefing, I tried to be a cool, young ensign by asking him, "Hey Skipper, it looks like you departed the aircraft (lost control) and almost crashed in the movie." His response, as best I could understand him through the yelling and screaming, was: "No, Ensign. It was fine and I had complete control throughout." Needless to say, the cockpit chatter that night was minimal.
the crazy part if he kept the turn he would have departed flight. but because the level out, he really had a nice control into that scene. what a a beautiful show of skill.
@@Omnidestrophic I was moved by the pilots skill. The Tomcat will always be the Aircraft to beat, if possible. The shocked look of the Japanese pilots of the Zeros!! I'm former Marine and love that movie
Blended the sound of a woman's scream and the scream of the fighter to make the sound in the scene more intense. Reminds me of how Lucas blended the trumpeting sound of an elephant and the passing of a truck over water to create the sound of a tie fighter It's the little things like that the audience rarely know that makes the sound in a scene more intense BTW as a 6yr old I was *convinced* that the pilots in the X-wings attacking the Death Star really did die, had this theory that they'd used prisoners on death row to do the scene as they were going to die anyway Scary how a kids mind works sometimes : )
Great movie and some of the greatest F-14 footage ever. Right up there with Top Gun but in The Final Countdown they had the outstanding Jolly Rogers livery on the F-14s, my all time favorite.
Yes, real fleet jets too as opposed to Top Gun with markings they did not use on the regular fleet jets! This one they just used the fleet jets which makes it all much more impressive (The markings on the actual Jet). I think the JR Cats in this movie look better........
I was going to like this comment- but you already had 84 likes and that just seemed waaaaay to appropriate. Almost spookey. So just know I liked it but that 84 is staying right where it is.
I saw this movie on the day it came out, and then went back the next day and watched it again, partly for the good-fun story, but really for the large screen tomcat footage, which was spectacular throughout. Still love it.
Great movie, I still look at it because of the of the best fleet of aircrafts in naval history! The F-14 was the best fleet defender with the Phoenix missile and swiped wing it was a bad ass jet. I like seeing all the other aircraft’s also. Best part of the movie is when the F-14 sneaks up on the zeros! Those guys are legends ! And thanks for your service gentleman 👍🏼
My thoughts too. And in a supersonic jet, 100ft is just a fraction of a second in pulling the stick to go up. If we count all military jets that collided with the ground in a flight demo, in the last 40 years since the movie came out, a lot of pilots got it wrong and a good portion paid with their lives for the mistake.
Considering the Tomcat is just over 60 feet long, he had a little under two plane lengths worth of altitude to work with by the time he pulled out of that.
Look at the right wing, the spoilers are up, he had the stick over to the right trying to keep it from rolling left. Backseat probably had his hand on the ejection handle.
I saw this movie immediately after it came out at a theater halfway between Houston and Galveston, and it was a dinner time show that was sparsely attended. Other than a couple of other aviation geek buddies, the audience was made up of about a dozen CAF members from the Galveston Wing. During the dogfighting scenes with the Zeros, they were all up hooting and hollering like they were watching their team at the Super Bowl. After the movie ended, one of them told me that the F-14 almost didn't pull out in time, so some of that "myth" emanated with them.
I don't know what part of Star Wars the "Empire strikes back"-movie was. But I remember when I was as a kid and a aviation enthusiast in "The final countdown". And since that day I have seen this movie more times than the "Star wars" movies. Sadly I have an Tomcat only seen a single time on the static display at a belgian airshow...
My Dad was a pilot, Military Retire when this movie came out. The very first time we viewed it, I know in one day's time, this scene was watched between 15 and 20 times! My Dad and I both dissected every millisecond of the dive! I "know" I have watched this part YTD over 100 times! Still Stunning to this day! I can't wait for the new movie to come out, Top Gun-Maverick! It was supposed to be released last May or June, but COVID stopped this in it's tracks. I still can't wait to see it. From friends I have heard it's one fantastic movie to watch with super incredible flight scenes!
I thought to myself the zero had a brief opportunity to to engage the F-14 as it was defenseless after depleting all its energy pulling out of its dive.
Fav scene is the 1st flyby when they "buzzed the yacht" (before the zero's blew it to bits...) - especially when "Charlie" the dog heard them coming :-)
LOVE THAT SCENE! You hear the WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM of the jet going over and the you see them flying up high after the high speed pass, they go there literally in no time. That is one of my fave scenes of the movies, that engine noise and then the pass over, rewound that 100 times.
We would get so low over the ocean that when you looked in the rear view mirrors you could see the rooster tails of water coming up from the exhaust, it was pretty awesome.
I have the limited edition DVD and what these pilots say about Catherine Ross when she refused to say hi to them while off the set and the payback she got is hilarious. The next aerial shoot a F-14 flies up to the camera plane and the pilot holds up a sign saying " F-You, Catherine Ross, we didn't want to meet you either". The next day they were all watching the dailies (previous shoots) and Catherine was in the front row when the Tomcat flew up with the sign.
Thats funny, when I saw that my first thought was, "Damn, our pilots are badass! If they are pulling stunts like that for a movie imagine what they could do in real combat"
Still one of the most underrated movies of all time. The whole setting is like 'WOW - what if...' and in fact, we don´t get the directors answer. And so, Pearl Harbor remains like history told us. But the point is, the US Navy recovered from that blow.
I was about the same age when my dad took me to see it in the theater. To say that I was impressed is a gross understatement. I went home and cracked open all his books on Vietnam to learn everything I could about those planes, bought and built models of the planes and every carrier I could get my hands on, and happily irritated my dad with all of the questions I had. I'm unashamed to admit that even to this day, TFC remains at the top of my list of the best movie ever made. The quality of the production, the cinematography, the story, and even the soundtrack all work in concert to make it a compelling watch--time and time again.
This is exactly moment from the movie when I've realized that this guy was in trouble. Rocking from wing to wing in low altitude was a sign, and the speed on the top of the barrel roll was almost near stall :)
He was also Fox's wingman. In the Mover interview, he said his comment at the time was, 'That's not good". IOW, he was aware that Fox nearly augered in.
I've got freestanding model of Fox's Tomcat, #202, sitting right here above my desk. My father and I were both made honorary members of VF84 while working on the film at NAS Key West.
Ummmm...as personally told to me in 1986 by one of the principals interviewed in this piece (I won’t say which)...well, let’s just say there was a very good reason for the next few seconds of film -the actual bottoming out- being strategically cut after viewing of the dailys. According to this same individual, the whole episode was an unplanned collision avoidance on the part of the F-14, caused when the ‘Zero’ did not fly the shot as briefed and climbed up into the F-14’s flight path.
Your story holds water to me. When I watched the movie and clip I got the sence that the scene was either seriously dramatic overkill or I was watching a few life goof up. I'm not a fighter pilot, but I do fly and I would not want to have been in that plane at that moment. Obviously some luck and extreme skill came into play there.
I saw this movie as a kid and was totally awestruck…action movie with sci-fi theme and moral questions about interfering with history…had it all….and Tomcats.
Actually there's an interview done with with the wingman released this past January where he confirms the almost put it in the drink. From the interview " Shoes " is no longer with us and since he's beyond any repercussions that might have befallen him the need to keep up the it was a trick of the camera story is no longer needed.
The whole time they say it's not as low as it looks.. then they explain it was 100' - which means it was probably a lot less. And for reference, that's about the distance from home plate to first base
I'm glad this movie has not been remade. Though, I would be interested if there was a movie about the Japanese fleet passing through that same portal and launching on the Pearl Harbor of today. I know it would probably be a one-sided affair but it would be fun to watch.
When he was going down he was gathering speed. When he had enough...he pulled up...HARD. No one was gonna die. But there was pucker factor there. I assure you.
I read in an article that when they screened the movie at the white house they cut that part out. Don't know if that's true or maybe they were just trying to write stuff for people to read.
So when passing by the Zeroes and the one Tomcat driver says "eh fox, that woke 'em up" the guy driving that Tomcat's callsign was actually Fox. Mind. Blown.
@@FP194 I did not know that actually. Does he go on any solo rants in that movie too? Any Princeton references? That’s one of my favourite movie rants ever.
He'd never admit that he didn't have control over that aircraft. Other Tomcat pilots I've heard talk about this say that he should've bought a lottery ticket that day.
“…you know the Chief of Naval Operations..” lol I got on a plane with my grandfather for a long flight, and brought the novel adaptation of The Final Countdown along to read. Once we got to cruising alt and settled down, they announced the movie for the flight… yep you guessed it.. The Final Countdown. This was Oct 1980.
The movie was my motivation to join the Navy, get thru AOCS ( which was not easy ), and obtain my wings of gold as an NFO! I did not get a RIO slot, but had loads of fun times flying in the S-3....WAR HOOVER!
How can you have a call sign of Fox--isn't that also the code word for a launched Air to Air Missile? Wouldn't that cause confusion? Fox, Fox 1. Fox, Fox 2. WTF?
@@gpapa31 While the Tomcat is undeniably a badass plane, much of its "presence" comes from featuring in some good Navy+Hollywood productions. Newer planes haven't really been given that same shot at the big screen. The Super Hornet only just got its chance with Top Gun's sequel. A new Final Countdown could do the same but include the F-35, since the original was more inclusive of the rest of the Air Wing than Top Gun was.
Not a pilot, but I seem to remember reading and hearing that in Air Combat Maneuver training, the "soft deck" is 5,000 ft. above the hard deck. Also, the F-14's wing-span is @64 ft. and length is @62 ft. So less than one and two thirds wingspans (or aircraft lengths) separated them from the water. When he acts like pulling out with 100 ft. of altitude is fine, it's NOT.. There's a reason they didn't show that to the Admiral until much later. They almost wrecked a multi-million dollar airplane, and more importantly, almost killed themselves.
@@FromGamingwithLove0456 You must be a Democrat. Only Democrats get so angry and triggered by the truth. I'd love to see you demonstrate how "crashing" into the flight deck and crashing into the water are practically the same thing...
@@406gunnut9 They almost wreck an airplane every time they land- fact is they don’t and didn’t. If I need to hold your hand through your own stupidity I’m not sure if calling me a democrat is going to save you.
Nice job of fighter pilot smack talk. Fox almost killed himself. An F-14 is 62 feet long, with a fully-extended wingspan of 64 feet. 100 feet is a fraction of a second.
When I first saw that when I was young I thought he almost bought it also .I bet it took the ground crew a while to pull a seat cover out his ass.was great to see that video i awalys wondered
Just so you know, not everyone who watched that "infamous Splash the Zeros" scene in "The Final Countdown", thought that the 'pilot' was going to fly the plane into the water. C'mon, this is a Kirk Douglas movie! And every pilot who's flying off of a Aircraft Carrier, that's being 'skippered' by Kirk Douglas is even "Better' than the very Best"!
Hate to be that guy but no way that was intentional, the way he's moving the plane around after the dive shows he was fighting for control to get it back up. If that was intentional it wasn't executed very well and T-6 almost splashed a Tomcat. The RIO was for sure wishing he wore his brown pants.
And people are silly enough to wonder why Naval Aviators are not to be referred to as pilots. Anybody can put an aircraft down on land, Only a Naval Aviator can put one down on a postage stamp, moving in a three dimensional arc, surrounded by water deeper than most airstrips are in length.
I've always noticed that when they're talking about the size of an aircraft carrier it's 4 and 1/2 acres of sovereign US territory but when they talk about Landing it's a postage stamp
@@scottnelson1066 I was on one for two and a half years. You've just gotta be there. Reporting aboard I turned the corner and was confronted with what had to be the biggest man-made object I'd ever seen in my life. Living on it, after a while you both grow on each other. Flying over it, it's both less and more intimidating. But it's really about everything I wrote after the postage stamp that you've mainly got to be concerned with. It's like being a good comedian, it's all about timing.
A real encounter would have the Tomcats destroy the Zeros from beyond visual range. In an actual merge (slow turning nose on target) dogfight, the Zeros would win.
The day I got my private pilot's license I flew over the water by Mom's oceanfront condo window on the 18th floor. But shucks, I was straight and level at just 100 knots in a Cessna 152. I guess I shouldn't compare it. Sorry.
It was. Mom was in the Womens Army Corps in WW2 and took flying lessons after the war. She was ahead of her time. She stopped just before soloing but was always adventurous. When I flew by her window she was waving a handkerchief at me and was so excited. Really miss that gal. @@AirTales
First time I saw this movie was on betamax! lol, i was a middle schooler and absolutely in love with the tomcat.. so much so that when I left high school I went in to the navy as an AZ, in an F-14 squadron during the first Persian gulf war. VF-74 Bedevilers out of oceana VA. good times!
WE were in love with the F-14 twin engine sweepwing Grumman Tomcat
I flew with Fox on my 5th flight in the F-14 back in 1984. He was the skipper of the RAG (Replacement Air Group) at Miramar. Since the movie was my motivator to join the Navy and try to earn my "wings of gold", Fox was kinda a special guy. After we completed our briefing, I tried to be a cool, young ensign by asking him, "Hey Skipper, it looks like you departed the aircraft (lost control) and almost crashed in the movie." His response, as best I could understand him through the yelling and screaming, was: "No, Ensign. It was fine and I had complete control throughout." Needless to say, the cockpit chatter that night was minimal.
the crazy part if he kept the turn he would have departed flight. but because the level out, he really had a nice control into that scene. what a a beautiful show of skill.
@@Omnidestrophic I was moved by the pilots skill. The Tomcat will always be the Aircraft to beat, if possible. The shocked look of the Japanese pilots of the Zeros!! I'm former Marine and love that movie
The Final Countdown was an awesome film that doesn't get the credit it deserved. Top notch acting and some of the best air to air footage ever!
It’s one of my guilty pleasures to watch that movie every few months, I love it!
Blended the sound of a woman's scream and the scream of the fighter to make the sound in the scene more intense. Reminds me of how Lucas blended the trumpeting sound of an elephant and the passing of a truck over water to create the sound of a tie fighter
It's the little things like that the audience rarely know that makes the sound in a scene more intense
BTW as a 6yr old I was *convinced* that the pilots in the X-wings attacking the Death Star really did die, had this theory that they'd used prisoners on death row to do the scene as they were going to die anyway
Scary how a kids mind works sometimes : )
Great movie and some of the greatest F-14 footage ever. Right up there with Top Gun but in The Final Countdown they had the outstanding Jolly Rogers livery on the F-14s, my all time favorite.
At museum I work at in Kalamazoo (the Airzoo) we have one in that livery right next to our SR-71
mine too
Yes, real fleet jets too as opposed to Top Gun with markings they did not use on the regular fleet jets! This one they just used the fleet jets which makes it all much more impressive (The markings on the actual Jet). I think the JR Cats in this movie look better........
@@seancagney1369 Best fleet livery.
I was going to like this comment- but you already had 84 likes and that just seemed waaaaay to appropriate. Almost spookey. So just know I liked it but that 84 is staying right where it is.
I gotta admit, that's what I wondered too, when I saw that scene in the movie. Dang, he almost hit the water. Glad to know it was all under control.
thank you Hollywood for not making a remake of this film like you did with Red dawn. why ruin perfection.
I saw this movie on the day it came out, and then went back the next day and watched it again, partly for the good-fun story, but really for the large screen tomcat footage, which was spectacular throughout. Still love it.
Great movie, I still look at it because of the of the best fleet of aircrafts in naval history! The F-14 was the best fleet defender with the Phoenix missile and swiped wing it was a bad ass jet. I like seeing all the other aircraft’s also. Best part of the movie is when the F-14 sneaks up on the zeros! Those guys are legends ! And thanks for your service gentleman 👍🏼
THE sound of that dive was more impressive. Just great
100ft is still so damn low
My thoughts too. And in a supersonic jet, 100ft is just a fraction of a second in pulling the stick to go up. If we count all military jets that collided with the ground in a flight demo, in the last 40 years since the movie came out, a lot of pilots got it wrong and a good portion paid with their lives for the mistake.
100ft is 150ft lower then their minimum clearance.
Considering the Tomcat is just over 60 feet long, he had a little under two plane lengths worth of altitude to work with by the time he pulled out of that.
Look at the right wing, the spoilers are up, he had the stick over to the right trying to keep it from rolling left. Backseat probably had his hand on the ejection handle.
@@5695q spoilers?
I saw this movie immediately after it came out at a theater halfway between Houston and Galveston, and it was a dinner time show that was sparsely attended. Other than a couple of other aviation geek buddies, the audience was made up of about a dozen CAF members from the Galveston Wing. During the dogfighting scenes with the Zeros, they were all up hooting and hollering like they were watching their team at the Super Bowl. After the movie ended, one of them told me that the F-14 almost didn't pull out in time, so some of that "myth" emanated with them.
Too bad this movie came out the same time as The Empire Strikes Back. Might have been a blockbuster.
I think it did about as well as it expected to. Seeing Empire Strikes Back didn't prevent me from seeing this one too.
I don't know what part of Star Wars the "Empire strikes back"-movie was. But I remember when I was as a kid and a aviation enthusiast in "The final countdown". And since that day I have seen this movie more times than the "Star wars" movies. Sadly I have an Tomcat only seen a single time on the static display at a belgian airshow...
@@MisterIvyMike Pretty sure Iran flies F-14's still. Think theirs are the Bombcat version though. I'd have to check.
I watched "Final Countdown" first, then the Star Wars movie. Both were great!
Nicee. That is still the most remarquable aerial scene ever having been filmed for a long long time to come.
My Dad was a pilot, Military Retire when this movie came out. The very first time we viewed it, I know in one day's time, this scene was watched between 15 and 20 times! My Dad and I both dissected every millisecond of the dive!
I "know" I have watched this part YTD over 100 times! Still Stunning to this day!
I can't wait for the new movie to come out, Top Gun-Maverick! It was supposed to be released last May or June, but COVID stopped this in it's tracks. I still can't wait to see it. From friends I have heard it's one fantastic movie to watch with super incredible flight scenes!
It's kinda cool after all these years to get a real answer to that question.
I thought to myself the zero had a brief opportunity to to engage the F-14 as it was defenseless after depleting all its energy pulling out of its dive.
Fav scene is the 1st flyby when they "buzzed the yacht" (before the zero's blew it to bits...) - especially when "Charlie" the dog heard them coming :-)
LOVE THAT SCENE! You hear the WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM of the jet going over and the you see them flying up high after the high speed pass, they go there literally in no time. That is one of my fave scenes of the movies, that engine noise and then the pass over, rewound that 100 times.
Fox was a great pilot there is no doubt may he rest in peace.
We would get so low over the ocean that when you looked in the rear view mirrors you could see the rooster tails of water coming up from the exhaust, it was pretty awesome.
I have the limited edition DVD and what these pilots say about Catherine Ross when she refused to say hi to them while off the set and the payback she got is hilarious. The next aerial shoot a F-14 flies up to the camera plane and the pilot holds up a sign saying " F-You, Catherine Ross, we didn't want to meet you either". The next day they were all watching the dailies (previous shoots) and Catherine was in the front row when the Tomcat flew up with the sign.
Classic!
ua-cam.com/video/IuH2WoAiMng/v-deo.html
I miss the F14, they should have upgraded it instead of retiring. Imagine what it could do now?
I've seen this movie in the theater, had it on VHS and dvd, I've watched it so much i can almost narrate or word for word
Thats funny, when I saw that my first thought was, "Damn, our pilots are badass! If they are pulling stunts like that for a movie imagine what they could do in real combat"
Commander Brown I was in the VF-84 squadron from 1977- 1979 I was your Mess Specialist for the squadron
I remember watching the scene years ago and thinking that must be low and fast. Great movie.
A little trivia
The actor who played Commander Dan Thurmond the executive officer also played
Colonel Bella in the original Red Dawn movie
Yeah he played the Cuban that tossed his rifle down.. He just wanted to go home...
Ron O Neal....also played Superfly RIP
Still one of my favorite movies and, just made me tingle in the pit of my stomach and a lump in my throat every time I saw the Tomcat.
Still one of the most underrated movies of all time. The whole setting is like 'WOW - what if...' and in fact, we don´t get the directors answer. And so, Pearl Harbor remains like history told us. But the point is, the US Navy recovered from that blow.
I remember seeing this movie when I was 12 years old. Awesome scene!
You and me both- back in the day where you could actually rewind so often as to wear out the VHS tape. Thank goodness for digital media.
I was about the same age when my dad took me to see it in the theater. To say that I was impressed is a gross understatement. I went home and cracked open all his books on Vietnam to learn everything I could about those planes, bought and built models of the planes and every carrier I could get my hands on, and happily irritated my dad with all of the questions I had. I'm unashamed to admit that even to this day, TFC remains at the top of my list of the best movie ever made. The quality of the production, the cinematography, the story, and even the soundtrack all work in concert to make it a compelling watch--time and time again.
Even with the zoom in, it looks like he had enough altitude to spare.
I'm not thinking 100 feet is "altitude to spare" the jet itself is 60 feet long.
This is exactly moment from the movie when I've realized that this guy was in trouble. Rocking from wing to wing in low altitude was a sign, and the speed on the top of the barrel roll was almost near stall :)
Alan “Shoes” Mullen is the guy in the red shirt
Looks like we have another C.W. Lemoine watcher here.
He was also Fox's wingman. In the Mover interview, he said his comment at the time was, 'That's not good". IOW, he was aware that Fox nearly augered in.
I've got freestanding model of Fox's Tomcat, #202, sitting right here above my desk. My father and I were both made honorary members of VF84 while working on the film at NAS Key West.
Thats pretty cool! Was there talk about this scene during your time on the set?
Ummmm...as personally told to me in 1986 by one of the principals interviewed in this piece (I won’t say which)...well, let’s just say there was a very good reason for the next few seconds of film -the actual bottoming out- being strategically cut after viewing of the dailys. According to this same individual, the whole episode was an unplanned collision avoidance on the part of the F-14, caused when the ‘Zero’ did not fly the shot as briefed and climbed up into the F-14’s flight path.
Your story holds water to me. When I watched the movie and clip I got the sence that the scene was either seriously dramatic overkill or I was watching a few life goof up. I'm not a fighter pilot, but I do fly and I would not want to have been in that plane at that moment. Obviously some luck and extreme skill came into play there.
I saw The Final Countdown movie 40 years ago I loved it and I love it now... cool movie! 👍🇳🇿
When I first saw this, my heart dropped too.
That was some crazy flying from FOX!
This was great back story to one of my favorite movies!
I saw this movie as a kid and was totally awestruck…action movie with sci-fi theme and moral questions about interfering with history…had it all….and Tomcats.
100 ft? That's still pretty low.
ikrrrr. he probably lost control but i guess he'll never admit that
They're talking it down but pulling out at 100ft after that maneuver is fucking close 😂
The real Right Stuff, naval aviators the best. This movie coming out in 4K soon.
right stuff was a true story stupid ass
@totally not famous person- that for sure! It’s obvious you never served in the military because if you did you would understand the comment, idiot.
This one of my favorite movies!! My dad took me to see it when it came out!!!
2:14 *...and ICONIC sound for sure!!*
he plays it off like he didn't fuck up.. that 100 ft off the deck was in no way intentional.
Actually there's an interview done with with the wingman released this past January where he confirms the almost put it in the drink.
From the interview " Shoes " is no longer with us and since he's beyond any repercussions that might have befallen him the need to keep up the it was a trick of the camera story is no longer needed.
Jake Dennis, the pilot of the Helo depicted in the movie, was my neighbor in San Diego (late 70s-early 80s)
In the top 10 favorite movies !
One of my Fav movies of all time
The whole time they say it's not as low as it looks.. then they explain it was 100' - which means it was probably a lot less. And for reference, that's about the distance from home plate to first base
The effect is called lens compression
Well done. Very well done. Excellent use of subliminal sounds.
A fighter pilot did a daring move.....this my shocked face......
I'm glad this movie has not been remade. Though, I would be interested if there was a movie about the Japanese fleet passing through that same portal and launching on the Pearl Harbor of today. I know it would probably be a one-sided affair but it would be fun to watch.
Man, it's akward to watch a scene of an F-14 taking off without "danger zone" playing in the background.
Not close at a 100 feet??!! What's considered close to these guys? By the way, I have always wondered about that sceen myself!
Well...an RAF Harriet pilot once lost his aircraft to a low level bird strike
Turned out to be a chicken
So...how high can a chicken fly?
I'm thinking 100 feet is closer than he cares to admit. The jet itself is 60 feet long.
When he was going down he was gathering speed. When he had enough...he pulled up...HARD. No one was gonna die. But there was pucker factor there. I assure you.
I read in an article that when they screened the movie at the white house they cut that part out. Don't know if that's true or maybe they were just trying to write stuff for people to read.
Great Movie, great pilots!
The best part was the cut to the japanese pilot, who is making that "the fuck is that asshole trying to pull?" Face
So when passing by the Zeroes and the one Tomcat driver says "eh fox, that woke 'em up" the guy driving that Tomcat's callsign was actually Fox.
Mind. Blown.
Did you know the actor who played the Commander Dan Thurmond the executive officer also played Colonel Bella in the original Red Dawn movie
@@FP194 I did not know that actually.
Does he go on any solo rants in that movie too? Any Princeton references?
That’s one of my favourite movie rants ever.
The world's greatest drive-in double feature - Final Countdown and Clash of the Titans! What a great time at the drive-in! (Now gone. :()
My last drive in double? Zoro Returns & Saving Private Ryan. The Route 611 Dive in is a shopping center now.
100 feet is still cutting it close! 😧
I always figured they were just showing off as normal is.
He'd never admit that he didn't have control over that aircraft. Other Tomcat pilots I've heard talk about this say that he should've bought a lottery ticket that day.
Anything F14 , in my opinion, is the best .
“…you know the Chief of Naval Operations..” lol
I got on a plane with my grandfather for a long flight, and brought the novel adaptation of The Final Countdown along to read. Once we got to cruising alt and settled down, they announced the movie for the flight… yep you guessed it.. The Final Countdown. This was Oct 1980.
The movie was my motivation to join the Navy, get thru AOCS ( which was not easy ), and obtain my wings of gold as an NFO! I did not get a RIO slot, but had loads of fun times flying in the S-3....WAR HOOVER!
Best movie ever. God, what a great movie.
So, the real pilot who did the mitical manouver was Emory Brown?.
No, "Fox" Ferrell
I've seen lower.
Would love to see a sequel where they actually attack the Japanese fleet.
_How low did he go?_
Yes, Sir.
Amazing Tomcat Driver!
How can you have a call sign of Fox--isn't that also the code word for a launched Air to Air Missile? Wouldn't that cause confusion? Fox, Fox 1. Fox, Fox 2. WTF?
Good question.
Wished they'd do a remake of this movie using gen 6 navy fighter.
They can use any plane they want nothing has the presence of the mighty Tomcat.
I'd rather see a sequel featuring USS Gerald R. Ford.
@@gpapa31 While the Tomcat is undeniably a badass plane, much of its "presence" comes from featuring in some good Navy+Hollywood productions. Newer planes haven't really been given that same shot at the big screen. The Super Hornet only just got its chance with Top Gun's sequel. A new Final Countdown could do the same but include the F-35, since the original was more inclusive of the rest of the Air Wing than Top Gun was.
Fox Farrell!
Reminds me of the Rafale blowing water at the bottom of a loop or the IA-63 literally burning the grass at over 700km/h
Reminded me of this one! ua-cam.com/video/nCNQ4Un8Joo/v-deo.html
@@MrRevertis just realized i did'nt include links.. check ua-cam.com/video/kCVQkjkT8lY/v-deo.html and ua-cam.com/video/ceDz8WgcexA/v-deo.html
Please, when you put something on the screen for people to read leave it up long enough to actually read it.
Not a pilot, but I seem to remember reading and hearing that in Air Combat Maneuver training, the "soft deck" is 5,000 ft. above the hard deck. Also, the F-14's wing-span is @64 ft. and length is @62 ft. So less than one and two thirds wingspans (or aircraft lengths) separated them from the water. When he acts like pulling out with 100 ft. of altitude is fine, it's NOT.. There's a reason they didn't show that to the Admiral until much later. They almost wrecked a multi-million dollar airplane, and more importantly, almost killed themselves.
They practically crash the aircraft every time they land aboard a carrier so how about you just go ahead and settle the fuck down.
@@FromGamingwithLove0456 You must be a Democrat. Only Democrats get so angry and triggered by the truth. I'd love to see you demonstrate how "crashing" into the flight deck and crashing into the water are practically the same thing...
@@406gunnut9 They almost wreck an airplane every time they land- fact is they don’t and didn’t.
If I need to hold your hand through your own stupidity I’m not sure if calling me a democrat is going to save you.
Nice job of fighter pilot smack talk. Fox almost killed himself. An F-14 is 62 feet long, with a fully-extended wingspan of 64 feet. 100 feet is a fraction of a second.
So is that an F-14A model or is it the F-14B or the F-14D model? My gut tells me its an A model
A Model with TF-30 engines.
@@georgesykes394 thank you
@@imadrifter You're welcome.
Neither the B nor the D existed in 1980.
When I first saw that when I was young I thought he almost bought it also .I bet it took the ground crew a while to pull a seat cover out his ass.was great to see that video i awalys wondered
What is the names of this film please ?
The Final Countdown
Just so you know, not everyone who watched that "infamous Splash the Zeros" scene in "The Final Countdown", thought that the 'pilot' was going to fly the plane into the water. C'mon, this is a Kirk Douglas movie! And every pilot who's flying off of a Aircraft Carrier, that's being 'skippered' by Kirk Douglas is even "Better' than the very Best"!
Hate to be that guy but no way that was intentional, the way he's moving the plane around after the dive shows he was fighting for control to get it back up. If that was intentional it wasn't executed very well and T-6 almost splashed a Tomcat. The RIO was for sure wishing he wore his brown pants.
It's a better movie then Topgun
Anything is better than lowgun
Snodgrass can fly that's for sure
Rip fox farell
French Air force pilot: ‘not low enough’
wow what amazing flying and effects his wifes scream mixed in with the egine scream never knew!!
And people are silly enough to wonder why Naval Aviators are not to be referred to as pilots. Anybody can put an aircraft down on land, Only a Naval Aviator can put one down on a postage stamp, moving in a three dimensional arc, surrounded by water deeper than most airstrips are in length.
I've always noticed that when they're talking about the size of an aircraft carrier it's 4 and 1/2 acres of sovereign US territory but when they talk about Landing it's a postage stamp
@@scottnelson1066 I was on one for two and a half years. You've just gotta be there. Reporting aboard I turned the corner and was confronted with what had to be the biggest man-made object I'd ever seen in my life. Living on it, after a while you both grow on each other. Flying over it, it's both less and more intimidating. But it's really about everything I wrote after the postage stamp that you've mainly got to be concerned with. It's like being a good comedian, it's all about timing.
Same thing in my book catsup ketchup
Wasn't Embrey Brown a test pilot for F-14 for U.S. Navy?
Yes! (Emory W. Brown)
Yes he did the carrier suitability testing in prototype #10. I think there is a clip of him on Wings doing that.
He was also one o f the guys that wrote the book on the Tomcat when it was first introduced into the fleet.
Must-see movie
The airplane was fine. But he needed a towel to dry off that big pair that ended up bouncing off a couple of waves.
I love this movie
A real encounter would have the Tomcats destroy the Zeros from beyond visual range. In an actual merge (slow turning nose on target) dogfight, the Zeros would win.
Splash two! I repeat, splash two zeroes!
The day I got my private pilot's license I flew over the water by Mom's oceanfront condo window on the 18th floor. But shucks, I was straight and level at just 100 knots in a Cessna 152.
I guess I shouldn't compare it. Sorry.
Sounds like a memorable flight!
It was. Mom was in the Womens Army Corps in WW2 and took flying lessons after the war. She was ahead of her time. She stopped just before soloing but was always adventurous. When I flew by her window she was waving a handkerchief at me and was so excited. Really miss that gal. @@AirTales
Gutsiest Move I Ever Saw.. wish I was F-14 Pilot Naval Aviator
Actual scene shown like 5 times with the ending cut out - cut back to old guys talking pffft
Harrier pilots (both UK and USMC) would do that with one eye closed and one arm behind their backs ;)