F-16 Gets Shot at with 6 Surface to Air Missiles | Thunderbird Pilot Reacts

About this video

Max breaks down cockpit footage of Major Tullia’s F-16 mission during the Gulf War, where Max describes the pilot being targeted by six Iraqi surface-to-air missiles while attacking an oil refinery near Baghdad. Max walks through the tactical decisions, HUD symbology, threat reactions, and formation dynamics as Tullia successfully delivers his weapon and evades all missiles through maneuvering alone—Max notes the pilot’s countermeasures malfunctioned and never deployed. Max recounts that Tullia made it back with minimal fuel and received the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Key takeaways

• Formation mutual support is critical—other pilots can spot threats you miss and make life-saving callouts during combat
• When lit up by threats, the briefed procedure may require you to defend yourself alone while the rest of the formation presses to complete the mission objective
• Effective threat reaction to surface-to-air missiles involves immediate tank jettison, maintaining energy/airspeed, putting the missile on your wing line, and aggressive maneuvering—sometimes pure flying skill is all you have if countermeasures fail

Episode details: published August 21, 2022 · 229.8K views · 21:32 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. The analysis and commentary described are Max Afterburner’s, attributed to him — his channel includes hypothetical-scenario and news-react content, which is presented as his analysis, not established fact.

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