What's the secret of rattlesnakes?

Any object in nature can emit an invisible infrared light, which is usually called infrared light. The intensity of this infrared ray is related to the temperature of the object. The higher the temperature, the more infrared rays are emitted. Therefore, infrared rays are a form of heat emitted by objects.

There is a rattlesnake in South America, belonging to Agkistrodon. It is about 2 meters long, yellow-green, with diamond-shaped black and brown spots, and a horny ring at the end, which makes a clear sound when swinging, so it is called "rattlesnake".

A rattlesnake has a pair of nests between its eyes and nostrils. Particularly sensitive to infrared rays. So when it preys, it doesn't look with its eyes, but judges what the hunted person is and how far it is according to the intensity of infrared rays it feels. For example, if a mouse runs past it, the rattlesnake can immediately detect it according to the infrared rays emitted by the mouse, and then jump on it and eat it.

Later, people imitated the special function of rattlesnakes and made an air-to-air missile to attack enemy planes. This name is called "Sidewinder" missile.

The missile was launched by a fighter plane. At the front end of its warhead, there is a device that can detect and receive infrared rays. This device cooperates with the guidance mechanism to control the missile to automatically find and chase enemy planes.

The reason why the Sidewinder missile can automatically track enemy planes is because the air ejected from the engine nozzle at the rear of the plane is very hot, and the infrared rays emitted are naturally strong. In this way, the infrared search device installed on the missile head receives more infrared rays, and then tracks this strong infrared rays through the guidance mechanism, and as a result, it will catch up with the aircraft that emits infrared rays.

Therefore, as long as the engine of the plane emits hot air, the "rattlesnake" missile will bite the enemy plane along the infrared ray like a rattlesnake catching a mouse until it hits.

However, when the rattlesnake missile approaches the plane, if the plane suddenly turns sharply, the hot air ejected from its tail will immediately change direction, and it will be difficult for the missile to receive the infrared ray that was originally tracked. At this time, the infrared rays emitted by the sun are much stronger, so the missile will fly towards the sun, fan the air, and finally explode on the ground.

On the morning of September 24th, 1958, Kuomintang military aircraft from Taiwan Province province flew over Wenzhou, the coastal area of Zhejiang province. These are 24 American F-86 fighter planes flying in two batches with the intention of killing people. On the F-86 plane, the "Rattlesnake" air-to-air missile, a secret weapon with considerable power at that time, was mounted.

This missile was first successfully developed by the United States in the early 1950s, and was equipped with the US military in July 1956. It is the first infrared guided air-to-air missile in the world. Its length is 2.84 meters, its diameter is 0. 127 meters, its weight is 70 kilograms, and it is shaped like a slender round bar. Its flying speed is twice the speed of sound, its launching distance is 1 ~ 7.6 km, and its maximum range is 1 1 km. The bomb contains 4.8 kilograms of high explosives. The warhead is equipped with an infrared guidance device, which can detect that hot air automatically attacks the target. It consists of guidance and control cabin, fuze, warhead, wing and rudder surface, in which the wing makes the missile fly stably and the rudder surface is used to control the flight direction.

When it was learned that the Kuomintang plane in Taiwan Province Province was about to invade, the fighters of our People's Liberation Army immediately took off to meet the enemy. Because I didn't know that the other plane was equipped with a "rattlesnake" missile, I still attacked according to the usual tactics.

During the engagement, our fighter plane bravely and quickly approached the enemy plane, and always fought hand-to-hand with the enemy plane, disrupting the formation of the enemy plane and making it impossible to launch the "rattlesnake" missile it carried.

At the same time, our No.3 plane fell behind in the process of approaching the enemy plane, and then it was encountered with the 12 enemy F-86 fighter plane that tried to sneak attack our fleet. 1 is more critical than 12.

At this time, I saw my No.3 machine desperately wedged into the enemy plane group from below, scuffled for 5 minutes, and shot down two enemy planes F-86 one after another. When No.3 plane was ready to quit the battle, it was unfortunately hit by a "rattlesnake" missile launched by an enemy plane, and the pilot died heroically.

This is the first time that missiles have been used in the history of world air combat. The remains of the rattlesnake missile are still preserved in the People's Revolutionary Military Museum in Beijing, China. Although rusty, it is a historical witness that the American invaders instructed Jiang Ji to use the rattlesnake missile.

1960 February 16, Taiwan Province Kuomintang air force dispatched four F-86 planes to conduct aerial reconnaissance and harassment on Fujian and the coastal areas of eastern Guangdong, two of which carried "rattlesnake" air-to-air missiles.

Maybe it was because the plane was equipped with a missile and one of my fighters was shot down with a "rattlesnake" missile. The pilots of the Kuomintang air force are a little high. After taking off, they kept the altitude 10000 meters and swaggered to the mainland coast.

At this time, under the guidance of the ground, our People's Air Force J-5 fighter formation approached the enemy plane at high speed. Immediately, the two sides launched an air battle.

Since one of my planes was shot down by an enemy plane with a "rattlesnake" missile, our air force pilots have summed up the experience and lessons, studied the tactics to deal with the "rattlesnake" missile, and prepared to crack down on the enemy plane for revenge.

When the enemy plane found that the J-5 was approaching it, it adopted the tactics of separating the two planes left and right in an attempt to lure the J-5 plane into submission, and then bypassed its tail to launch a missile attack.

Our air force pilots have long been alert and prepared for this move by enemy planes, and of course they will not let this move succeed. The captain, who was located in the middle of the J-5 formation, was quick-sighted and saw from the lower left of his plane that the F-86 was turning and biting the tail. He immediately took the tactics of golden cicada shelling, and suddenly turned sharply to the left at the other side to get rid of the tail biting of the enemy plane. After staggering a certain distance from the enemy plane, he buckled it to the right again. In a blink of an eye, it turned from defending to attacking, biting the enemy aircraft formation No.3 carrying the "rattlesnake" missile.

The pilot of the enemy plane didn't expect the move of the J-5 plane, and he was very alarmed. He was at a loss and rushed to the front of the J-5 plane before he could slow down. This not only changed the enemy plane from active to passive, but also was forced into melee by the J-5 plane. This is a no-no for F-86 aircraft carrying missiles.

This is because missile attacks are usually carried out far behind the tail of the aircraft, and it is difficult to launch missiles when they are intertwined. Even if they are launched, it is easy to accidentally injure their own aircraft. On the other hand, the aircraft has poor maneuverability after carrying missiles and cannot compete with the better performance J-5 aircraft.

At this point, the enemy pilots saw that the situation was not good and quickly launched the "rattlesnake" missile in an attempt to abandon the bomb. But our air force pilots refused to let go, and the battalion commander chased after him with a fighter plane. After fierce competition and fighting, the battalion chief fired twice and injured an F-86 plane. In the tense air battle, another enemy plane carrying a missile was forced to fly out of the "rattlesnake" missile in order to escape. The whole air battle lasted less than 10 minute, and ended with one enemy plane injured and two missiles lost in vain, which showed the fearless fighting spirit of our People's Air Force who dared to fight with enemy planes carrying missiles, calmly responded to the battle and thwarted enemy planes' attempts.

At present, dozens of air-to-air missiles have been developed, equipped and used all over the world, and the "rattlesnake" missile is one of them.

Judging from the control and guidance mechanism of air-to-air missiles, there are two main types used at present: one is to track targets by using infrared rays emitted by other aircraft, such as "rattlesnake" missiles; The other is to pursue the target by using the radar reflected from the other plane.

Due to the rapid development of modern science and technology, modern combat aircraft have been generally equipped with electronic optical systems that can automatically identify targets, and the performance of the control and guidance mechanism of air-to-air missiles has also been greatly improved. It is possible to use remote-controlled drones for air combat in the future. By then, aircraft and air-to-air missiles will appear in a newer look.