Flying Machine
Aircraft are machines and they fail. Flying is inherently risky. Each fighter jet is as important as any equipment in the military and costs 100’s of million. The aircraft itself has a flight life. With limited budget available, India prefers to overhaul, so that it comes out with zero hours on the airframe, new wirings as well as hydraulics, avionics, etc. as well as overhaul of the jet engine. Hence the overhauled aircraft will be around for another 15–20 years!
However, in peace time IAF does a lot of flying and hence few incidents/accidents are inevitable. As opposed to what people comprehend, IAF has the lowest attrition rate in years. During combat the life expectancy could seriously drop due to damage, aggressive performance, and climate and possibly add bad maintenance to it. Not literally, but somewhat true, A 50 year old geezer MIG 21 shooting down a F16, demonstrates that when jet fighters are in good hands, it doesn't matter how old the aircraft is even the world's most rugged aircraft can be turned into ball of flames. Proudly say Congratulations (Abhinandan).
Except the new entrant Tejas and Rafale, all other flying jets are at least 10–15 years old (Sukhoi and MIG 29) or more than 25 year old (Mirage, Jaguar, MIG 27, MIG 21). An airframe life for a jet fighter is normally between 2500 to 8000 hours. Every Aircraft comes with limited flight hours after which either it has to be overhauled or replaced.
Flying Coffin
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