The new Top Gun movie is finally out in the world, continuing the story of the iconic Maverick from the 1986 classic movie. Tom Cruise is well known for his love of flying and driving every vehicle on the planet, but the original Top Gun saw him actually fly the F-14 twin tailed Tomcat fighter jet.
The F-14 first flew on 21 December 1970 and made its first deployment in 1974 with the U.S. Navy aboard USS Enterprise. On it’s first flight the Tom Cat experienced some issues with a hydraulic failure causing the first F-14 to crash. On the second flight the was another hydraulic failure and the pilot lost control over the aircraft, forced them to eject. In the end the F-14 was fixed by changing the hydraulic lines from titanium to stainless steel.
The F-14 Tomcat was retired by U.S. Navy on 22 September 2006, and was replaced with the Boeing F-18 Super Hornet. This plane features in the new movie, however Tom wasn’t allowed to fly that one. The cost of just one F-18 would have been the equivalent of half the movie’s whole budget!
Remember the bar scene from the 1986 movie? "You've lost loving feeling" ... we make some excellent Stanless Steel Bar Sinks, and we were around in 1986 (unfortunately though, we didn't get any of our products in the movie!)