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Old 04-22-2017, 06:37 PM   #769
Clodfobble
UNDER CONDITIONAL MITIGATION
 
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Austin, TX
Posts: 20,012
Funny story about the F-117... The US military had numbered their planes sequentially since the beginning, except they skipped F-13 for superstitious reasons. But then after the F-18, they jumped to F-20, and fueled wild speculation about a top-secret spy plane that was already numbered 19 that no one knew existed. Everyone began taking this supposed F-19 stealth fighter as a given, putting it in action novels, making model airplane kits for it, etc... until finally the military did admit that they had a super secret spy plane--but it wasn't called the F-19, no, it was the F-117. A number which made no sense, and no other planes above 100 were ever made afterwards. A lot of people figured they just changed the number after the fact because they wanted to have the upper hand and tell everyone, "No, you were wrong, see?"
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