{"id":46929,"date":"2024-06-22T16:00:26","date_gmt":"2024-06-22T20:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=46929"},"modified":"2024-06-22T16:00:31","modified_gmt":"2024-06-22T20:00:31","slug":"the-mystery-has-been-solved-why-is-a-jet-sitting-near-downtown-plant-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/06\/22\/the-mystery-has-been-solved-why-is-a-jet-sitting-near-downtown-plant-city\/","title":{"rendered":"THE MYSTERY HAS BEEN SOLVED. WHY IS A JET SITTING NEAR DOWNTOWN PLANT CITY?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

If you were to drive on West Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.  you would probably say, \u201cThere\u2019s a jet sitting in that parking lot!\u201d \u201cWhy?\u201d \u201cWhat kind of jet is it?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Age and the Florida sun have made insignia and decals nearly invisible. But what remains clear is the number \u201c9297\u201d just from the cockpit. It turns out these numbers are enough to identify the plane. This aircraft is a Mikoyan-Gurevich (MiG)-21. MiGs were Soviet fighters that went through several iterations as they progressed from propeller-driven aircraft to jet propulsion. The MiG-21, first developed in 1955, was a single-engine, fixed-wing jet able to fly at Mach 2 (twice the speed of sound, or 1522 miles per hour). This fighter was a relatively low-cost, highly maneuverable jet that was easy to operate from rough airfields, and easy to maintain. However, pilots nicknamed it \u201cThe Flying Coffin\u201d due to its frequency of in-flight failures. MiGs were manufactured from 1958 to 1985 and were the infamous fighters flown in the Vietnam War by communist North Vietnam. This particular jet is a MiG-21UM Mongol B\u2014a 2-seater training aircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though the fighter is a two-seater, the space for each person is tight. It is almost like the pilot is strapped in the jet. A pilot had room for his arms to go underneath controls and above controls. Flyers legs were forced partially under the seat.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tracing the history of this MiG shows the first assignment on record took \u201c9297\u201d to Poland in 1980. This is confirmed by the faded checkerboard on the tail\u2014the national marking of the Poland Air Force. The other faded insignia, a red eagle with green wings and head, shows the jet was a part of Number 141 Squadron, 4th Air Regiment. The recorded station was Malbork Military Air Base Airport in Pomerania, Poland. Sometime after this date, the Poland Air Force stored the aircraft at an airport in Krosno, Poland. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2012, Draken International in Lakeland, Florida purchased \u201c9297.\u201d Draken provides aircraft to serve as adversaries in tactical military combat training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Draken contracted with Plant City\u2019s Starr Creations to make military-grade fire-resistant panels for some of its aircraft. In a meeting between Draken and Starr Creations, Draken employees said they had several MiGs they needed to sell. Aaron Starr, an owner of Starr Creations, jokingly said, \u201cI\u2019ll take one off your hands.\u201d In October 2021 Draken staff brought \u201cScary\u201d paperwork to Starr and told him to, \u201cSign it, pick out a jet, and get it out of here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the transfer to Starr Creations, Draken removed explosive charges used to eject the pilot and low-grade radioactive material used to keep the instrumentation lit (we\u2019re all thankful for that). The MiG did come with an unused engine, which Starr Creations removed and sold for parts. The paperwork Starr signed made a commitment the jet could never again be made operational, no matter who owned it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s basically a yard ornament,\u201d commented Aaron Starr. \u201cI\u2019ve had multiple people come here\u2014pilots and civilians\u2014to talk to me about MiGs. Passersby stop and take pictures and want to talk about it.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you were to drive on West Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.  you would probably say, \u201cThere\u2019s a jet sitting in that parking lot!\u201d \u201cWhy?\u201d \u201cWhat kind of jet is… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":46930,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"17","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[17],"tags":[8883],"class_list":["post-46929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regional-and-world-news","tag-the-mystery-has-been-solved-why-is-a-jet-sitting-near-downtown-plant-city"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46929"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46929\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46931,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46929\/revisions\/46931"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}