Fairchild-Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II / "Warthog"

[jslugman]

Ever seen these white pods mounted on both twin missile rails on stations 1/11 before?

[Jay Beckman]

ACMI Pods?

Dunno why there would be two though...

[Joe Copalman]

Supporting ANG/AFRC Test Center work? 

They don't look like standard ACMI pods. 

[Jay Beckman]

Good Point...

Given that it's Test/Eval work though, they're probably jacked into some network of some kind, eh?

[wingsnstuff]

Maryland Air National Guard at Test Eval?  I looked through all my reference material and across the web, but couldn't find anything that looked like these.  Because there is two, I'm guessing weapons.  Because they're sitting on the Sidewinder rails, I was wondering if they might be a next step in the Sidewinder evolution.  The 9X barely had fins - maybe no fins is the next step in the evolution.  They have a shape similar to a skinny SLAMMER but without fins. 

[CJPalmer]

Perhaps they are practice missiles, live head and dummy body.

[jslugman]

They look longer/skinnier than the AIM family and no apparent seeker head. Even the old ACMI pods without the antenna had the front antenna-ish nose and were fatter. Just darn curious.....

[jslugman]

Spent some time digging around, looks like they *may* be what's called an IGI (Inertial GPS Integration) pod. I've seen versions of it with 4 antenna like the ACMI pods and a single reference without them. If I find anything else I'll let you know so we know what the heck they are.

[Jay Beckman]

High-speed pass by an A-10 Demo West bird after Heritage Flight duties at AirVenture 2010:

[jslugman]

It's too clean, needs gun residue on the nose and a weed or two tucked into a wing tip. Other then that a stellar image Jay!

[Jay Beckman]

What can I say?  It's a demo bird.   

I mean, what other A-10 will you ever see where you could eat off the GAU-8 nozzle...?! 

[jslugman]

True, true. They look so odd without the pylons.

[Bubak]

[jslugman]

Top-side shot from underneath.... NICE!

[Joe Copalman]

The lighting is what it is, but I like this shot in spite of it.