The Thunderbirds Squadron tours the United States and much of the world, performing aerobatic formation and solo flying in specially marked aircraft.

In addition to their air demonstration responsibilities, the Thunderbirds are part of the USAF combat force and if required, can be rapidly integrated into an operational fighter unit.

There is also an extra piece of humor regarding the inverted performance of Thunderbird 5: the pilots all wear tailored flight suits with their name and jet number embroidered on the left breast.

One of the Thunderbirds' standing engagements is the annual commencement ceremony at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.

The jets fly over Falcon Stadium at the precise moment the cadets throw their hats into the air at ceremony's end.

[2] After six months training in an unofficial status, the Thunderbirds were activated on 25 May 1953 as the 3600th Air Demonstration Team at Luke AFB, just west of Phoenix.

The next year the Thunderbirds performed their first overseas air shows, in a tour of South and Central America, and added a permanent solo routine to the demonstration.

For a time, if the show's sponsor permitted it, the pilots would create a sonic boom; this ended when the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) banned supersonic flight over the continental United States.

In 1961, the team was compelled to discontinue the vertical bank maneuver due to an FAA regulation prohibiting aerobatics that pointed the nose of the aircraft toward the crowd.

2 aircraft during a pitch-up maneuver that resulted in the death of Capt Gene Devlin at Hamilton Air Force Base on 9 May.

In 1969, the squadron re-equipped with the front-line F-4E Phantom, which it flew until 1973, the only time the Thunderbirds would fly jets similar to those of the Navy's Blue Angels as it was the standard fighter for both services in the 1960s and 1970s.

The switch saw an alteration of the flight routine to exhibit the aircraft's maneuverability in tight turns, and ended the era of the black tail on the No.

Visually cueing off the lead aircraft during formation maneuvering, the wing and slot pilots disregarded their positions relative to the ground.

[6][Note 1] The team's activities were suspended for six months pending investigation of the crashes and review of the program, then reinstituted using the General Dynamics F-16A Fighting Falcon in 1983 and upgraded to the F-16C (now produced by Lockheed Martin) in 1992.

The United States Postal Service honored the Air Force's 50th anniversary as a separate branch of the military in 1997 with a limited edition stamp featuring the Thunderbirds.

In 2007, during Maj. Malachowski's final season as a Thunderbird, the team selected its second female pilot, Captain Samantha Weeks, who flew the No.

Outside of aerial demonstrations, the team participated in eight official public relations events attended by heads of state and local civic leaders.

On 10–11 November 2007, the City of Las Vegas and Nellis AFB saluted the U.S. Air Force, hosting the capstone event of the USAF's 60th anniversary celebration.

7 (operations officer), and the first-ever Air Force Reserve Command pilot, Maj. Sean Gustafson, also joined the team as Thunderbird No.

The 2009 Far East Tour took the team to multiple locations on the western border of the Pacific Rim and included performances in Hawaii, Australia, Malaysia, Guam, Thailand, Japan and South Korea.

The top-rated show "Qualifications of Man" did a one-hour feature on the Thunderbirds and resulted from a coordinated media pitch to the network and the Republic of Korea Air Force.

In addition to the air shows, the Thunderbirds personally met and spent time with more than five hundred special needs children and orphans.

The entire 2013 flying season was canceled due to budget cuts resulting from the United States fiscal cliff.

Only three fatal crashes have occurred during air shows, two of them in jets: The first was the death of Major Joe Howard, flying Thunderbird No.

[23] The second death occurred 9 May 1981 at Hill AFB, Utah, when Captain David "Nick" Hauck flying Thunderbird No.

With black smoke billowing from the exhaust and the aircraft losing altitude in a high nose-up attitude, the safety officer on the ground radioed Capt Hauck: "You're on fire, punch out!"

The aircraft continued to stay airborne for about half a mile before hitting a large oak tree and a barn, then sliding across a field and flipping as it traversed an irrigation canal—ultimately erupting into a fireball just a few hundred feet from the runway's end.

The Skyblazers were disbanded in January 1962 when their home squadron was rotated back to the United States and their assigned aircraft transitioned to the F-105 Thunderchief.

[citation needed] The "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" were a group of four C-130 Hercules transport pilots and their planes who were officially recognized as an aerial demonstration team by the USAF's Tactical Air Command in 1957.