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Originally Posted by junglist
As for the Tehran incident, eburacum45 states that the intercepting aircraft didn't get near to the lights. It is my understanding from reading the testimony of those involved that the first F4 got as near as 25NM before losing all instrumentation and communications. The second F4, scrambled 10 mins after the first, had visual confirmation of the target and radar lock on from 27NM, at that point a second UFO came from the original light and flew towards them rapidly. The pilot tried to shoot this down with an AIM 9 missile but lost power in his instruments, at the same time he also lost communications. The F 4 broke off from engaging the objects but was followed by the second object which was 3-4 NM behind them, that then broke off and returned to the original UFO. That sounds like they got pretty close to me.
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Klass mentions the Teheran incident in one of his books. I don't have it readily available but he did bring up some important points about the F-4s. The Iranians were apparently not the best at maintaining their aircraft. Having a jet malfunction was not out of the ordinary in such aircraft. Do we know the history of the aircraft? Did it have a tendency to fail under certain circumstances? Without any documentation, it is hard to say but it seems possible the power failure may have been a fault or pilot mistake while under duress. Additionally, I am not sure how the pilot, who was flying in the opposite direction, could determine that the second UFO went back to the first. It was my understanding that this second "UFO" fell to the ground or disappeared.