Eli5 why do military planes fly in a formation

Question

Does it have specific tactical advantages or is it just cool?

Edit to add: what about specific types of formations, like a Flying V vs a Diamond vs whatever else they can do?

In: 797

Answer 1

Probably not who you’re directing the question towards, but for helicopters, spacing and formation is determined by the types of threats we are expecting to encounter and the landing area we’re going to. It’s important for us to either maximize our fields of fire for our door guns by being closer or have more individual maneuverability from being further. It also depends heavily on the ground force and how they want us to land/the dimensions and environmental considerations of the landing area (trees, dust, wires, enemy on the LZ, etc.)

Source – blackhawk pilot