The F-104 Starfighter was a revolutionary design with short razor-sharp wings. It was the first aircraft to be able to maintain Mach 2 not just in short bursts. The Starfighter shattered speed and rate of climb records that still are impressive today. This extremely high speed earned the plane the nickname “The Missile With A Man In It”. Because of financial considerations 15 or more countries purchased the F-104. The Starfighter flew with the USAF in 1958 and the last airplane was decommissioned in Italy in 2004. F-104G s/n 63-12716 c/n 683D-6068 first flew on August 21, 1964. On January 1965 the aircraft was shipped to Spain and assigned to the 61st Escuadrón on March 4, 1965 and with 19 hours flying time the aircraft transferred to the renamed 161 Escuadrón and coded 161-12. In 1967 the aircraft became 104-12 with 104 Escuadrón and in 1968 it became 104-02. In 1971 transferred to 122 Escuadrón and retired in May 1972. It was sent back to the USAF who later in 1972 sent it to Turkey where it crashed in 1974.