Lockheed F-104 Starfighter F-104S

The F-104S was the final development of the Starfighter family and the longest-serving. With the USAF no longer interested in the F-104, Lockheed proposed the Model CL-901, featuring the new J79-GE-19 engine and the improved Sparrow III; in parallel it studied the CL-958 with larger wings, the CL-981 with retractable canards behind the cockpit and the CL-984 optimised for low-level strike. A modified RF-104G flew in December 1966 as the prototype Super Starfighter. Externally the new type had slightly larger intakes and steel inlet guide vanes that raised the operating temperature from 121 to 175 °C, enabling a maximum speed of Mach 2.2.

In Italy the need was pressing: in the first five years of service 23 F-104Gs had been lost and, of 149 acquired, only 80 to 90 were operational at best, so a new interceptor and fighter-bomber was to be bought. The mid-1960s AW-X (All-Weather-eXperimental) requirement evaluated, among others, the F-4B/C Phantom, the Mirage IIIC-1, the BAC Lightning and the F-100S Super Sabre, but the choice fell on the Lockheed CL-980, a simplified version with the wings of the CL-901. On 26 January 1966 the Italian Air Force chose the definitive F-104S. The first prototype was a modified Fiat-built F-104G (MM6658) that flew on 22 December 1966 as an aerodynamic prototype; the second (MM6660), with avionics closer to the production standard, flew on 28 February 1967, and the first production F-104S built by Aeritalia (MM.6701) flew on 30 December 1968.

The F-104S carried the NASARR R-21G/H radar with moving target indicator and a continuous-wave illuminator for semi-active radar homing missiles, initially the AIM-7 Sparrow; two extra wing and two extra underbelly hardpoints for a total of nine; the J79-GE-19 rated at 52.8 kN dry and 79.6 kN with afterburner; and two additional ventral fins for stability at high Mach numbers. In the attack role it could carry up to seven 227 or 340 kg bombs, twice what the F-104G could lift on five hardpoints, two of them taken by drop tanks. It was built in two interchangeable configurations, an interceptor with Sparrows and without the M61 Vulcan cannon and a fighter-bomber with the gun and air-to-surface weapons, so it is unclear how many were built to each standard. With the new engine it climbed at up to 277 m/s and reached Mach 2 at 12,000 metres in around five minutes; Aeritalia test pilot Napoleone Bragagnolo flew from Turin to Ciampino in 19 minutes 30 seconds, climbing to 15 km and accelerating to Mach 2, and still landed with enough fuel to continue to Palermo at subsonic speed.

It entered service in mid-1969 with 22° Gruppo of 51° Stormo. The Italian Air Force received 205 aircraft between 1969 and 1979, the 100th delivered in January 1973 and the 200th in May 1976. The only other customer was Turkey, which placed its first order in 1974; the first 18 aircraft arrived in December 1974 as a gift from Libya during the US embargo that followed the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, and the Turkish total reached 40, serving with 142 and 182 Filo until the mid-1990s.

The loss rate remained high, with peaks in 1973 and 1975; up to 1997 Italy lost 137 F-104s of all versions, 38 percent, in 928,000 flying hours, and the press nicknamed it bara volante, the flying casket. In the 1991 Gulf War six Italian F-104s were deployed to Turkey to protect it against possible Iraqi attacks, and twelve flew over the Balkans in Deny Flight, Deliberate Force and Allied Force. Two upgrades kept it going until the Eurofighter Typhoon arrived: the F-104S-ASA, developed in 1986, with the FIAR R21G/M1 Setter look-down radar, Aspide missiles and AIM-9Ls, applied to 147 airframes at a cost of around six hundred billion lire, and the ASA/M, focused on reliability rather than combat capability, which covered 49 ASA aircraft and 15 TF-104Gs from 1998. The last were withdrawn from front-line service in October 2004, after more than forty years of the type in Italy and around a million flying hours; the Italian Air Force test centre flew four until July 2005, and the last military flight of an F-104 took place at Pratica di Mare on 27 July.