South Korea’s Black Hawk Acrobat Team Landed in Taiwan

At about 11 a.m. on August 18th, several T-50B jet aircraft of the South Korean Black Hawk Aerobatic Flight Squadron completed an aerial performance in the Philippines and landed at Kaohsiung International Airport in Taiwan. After about four hours of refueling and routine maintenance, the fleet took off and returned to their base in South Korea.Military experts said that the reason why they chose to stay in Kaohsiung was that the route from Manila to Seoul exceeded the maximum range that the T-50B could fly. The T-50 Golden Eagle is an advanced trainer designed and manufactured by the Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) with the assistance of Lockheed Martin of the United States. Its main function is to train fighter pilots, with a range of 1,850 kilometers.

 The straight air distance from Manila to Seoul is about 2,700 kilometers. On this route, in addition to Taiwan, the major airports on the southeast coast of mainland China, Miyakojima-shi Airport in Japan, and Japan Air Self-Defense Force Naha Base and the U.S. Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa can be used as transit refueling points for the Black Hawk aerobatics fleet. No matter where they choose to refuel, the total flight range they experience is not much different from that of stopping in Kaohsiung, which is negligible. Considering the intense situation in the Taiwan Strait, the South Korean squadron choice to land in Taiwan was quite intriguing.