Reenacting Bombing Missions in an F-117 Nighthawk

Ride along on a Microsoft Flight Simulator journey through history in the world's first top-secret stealth aircraft.

Patrick Chovanec

Monday, April 15, 2024 at 01:06 PM ET

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F-117 Nighthawk in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020. [Courtesy: Patrick Chovanec]

Key Takeaways:

The F-117 Nighthawk, developed in secret by Lockheed's "Skunk Works" in the 1970s, pioneered stealth technology by using flat, angled surfaces and radar-absorbent materials based on Pyotr Ufimtsev's theory that an object's shape, not size, primarily determines its radar reflection.
Designed as a subsonic attack aircraft for covert missions, the F-117 incorporates numerous stealth features such as internal weapon bays, shielded engines without afterburners, and an infrared targeting system (lacking radar), making it inherently unstable to fly without computer assistance.
The F-117 achieved remarkable success in its combat debut during the 1991 Gulf War, conducting numerous high-value strikes with no losses, solidifying its reputation as a technological marvel, despite only one aircraft ever being shot down in combat (during the 1999 Kosovo conflict).
Although officially retired and replaced by newer stealth aircraft like the F-22 and F-35, some F-117s are reportedly still flying, possibly used for training purposes to detect and intercept stealthy adversaries.

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Today on Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, I’m at Homey Airport (KXTA), also known as Groom Lake, aka “Area 51.” I’ve come here to the remote Nevada desert to fly one of the most iconic top secret aircraft of all time: the F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter.

The story of the F-117 begins in 1964, when Soviet mathematician Pyotr Ufimtsev published the paper, Method of Edge Waves in the Physical Theory of Diffraction. It demonstrated that the radar return from an object depended more on its shape than size. Given the technology at the time, Ufimtsev’s insight was dismissed as impractical in Russia. But by the 1970s, given friendly aircraft losses to SAMs (surface-to-air missiles) in Vietnam and the Middle East, engineers at Lockheed’s “Skunk Works”—famous for designing cutting edge military planes like the P-38 Lighting, U-2 spy plane, and F-104 Starfighter—began taking the idea seriously.