Usually planes are able to fly when air moves across the wings which generates lift. But how do fighter jets able to maintain lift while performing aerobatic maneuvers?
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There are a lot of misconceptions about lift. One big one is how significant the Bernoulli effect is on lift, this is the common explanation of “air moves over the wings which generates lift.” The more important component to lift is the simple act of air hitting the wing at a slight angle, air bounces down, Newton’s third law pushes the plane up.
As long as your plane is slightly angled against the direction of your motion/the air around you, then the plane will have a force on it. Sometimes this is the whole wing, sometimes this is just an aileron.
And sometimes you don’t even need lift. As long as there’s a good mile between you and the ground, its ok to “fall” for a little while before bringing your aircraft back to a position where it generates lift. And if you can create enough vertical speed, you also buy yourself a little more time before you need lift. A loop involves turning your plane up to convert all your horizontal speed to vertical speed by means of lift due to higher angle of attack. That vertical speed can get you pretty high before gravity starts calling again.
Lastly, those engines on fighter jets are powerful, sometimes they have a bigger thrust to mass ratio which means they alone can provide enough force to fight gravity. Though you don’t necessarily need strong engines to do acrobatics.
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