--- title: "Hill Air Force Base Executes The Mother Of All Elephant Walks With 52 F-35s" description: "The huge display of sortie generation capability comes as the base's F-35 force reaches full capacity after transitioning to the F-35 years ago." date: "2020-01-06" modified: "2020-01-06" authors: - name: "Tyler Rogoway" job_title: "Editor-in-Chief" link: "https://www.twz.com/authors/tyler-rogoway.md" url: "https://www.twz.com/31743/hill-air-force-base-executes-the-mother-of-all-elephant-walks-with-52-f-35s" categories: - "Air" - "Air Forces" - "Americas" - "Around The Globe" - "Bunkers & Installations" - "F-35" - "Fighters" - "News & Features" - "Stealth" - "U.S. Air Force" - "U.S. Homeland" tags: - "388th Fighter Wing" - "419th Fighter Wing" - "Elephant Walk" - "exercise" - "F-35" - "F-35A" - "Hill AFB" - "readiness" - "runway" - "Utah" --- # Hill Air Force Base Executes The Mother Of All Elephant Walks With 52 F-35s ![]() *www.twz.com* The 388th and 419th Fighter Wings that call Hill Air Force Base in Utah home have just executed a massive readiness drill that included an 'elephant walk' of a whopping 52 F-35As. The exercise coincides with the wings reaching full strength following the transition to the F-35A, a process that began years ago. The [elephant walk]() and the massive number of flights that [usually go along with it]() are all about sortie generation and displaying a level of readiness that could be leveraged during a full-blown crisis. Both [wings held a similar exercise]() in November of 2018 with 35 aircraft, which was highly impressive, but 52 is a whole other story. Just the amount of hardware on the runway in terms of billions of dollars is staggering. https://twitter.com/_/status/1214263171575271424 That same runway in the image is also quite fresh as a major rehabilitation of it [wrapped up this summer](). This kept many of Hill's resident aircraft away, including being [sent on combat deployments](), as flying needed to continue during the construction period. We know that large waves of launches and recoveries are also part of the drill as the base gave local residents a heads-up in advance of the increased level of activity in the hours to come. https://twitter.com/_/status/1213977271767166976 This elephant walk of 5th generation fighters is also a reminder that Hill AFB is truly on the leading edge of combat aviation and considering the construction [projects underway at the base]() alone, it will continue to be for the foreseeable future. We will update this post when more images and information becomes available. ***Update: 2:03pm PST—*** More shots! ![message-editor%2F1578348252008-1000w\_q9547.jpg]() **U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw** ![message-editor%2F1578348263394-1000w\_q9548.jpg]() **U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw** ![message-editor%2F1578348269961-1000w\_q9546.jpg]() **U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw** ![message-editor%2F1578348281074-1000w\_q9549.jpg]() **U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw** ![message-editor%2F1578348293760-1000w\_q9550.jpg]() **U.S. Air Force photo by R. Nial Bradshaw** And video: https://twitter.com/_/status/1214298810999984131 *Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com* ## Author Tyler’s passion is the study of military technology, strategy, as well as foreign policy, and he has fostered a dominant voice on those topics in the defense and national security space. Tyler was the creator of the hugely popular defense site *Foxtrot Alpha* before developing *TWZ*, which he continues to lead as the Editor-In-Chief to this day. ### Author social links [Twitter]()