'Zeus' nose art panel from F/A-18A Hornet A21-34: Leading Aircraftman Patrick Kelly, 3 Squadron, RAAF

Port side, rectangular shaped hinged aluminium and synthetic access panel depicting a hand drawn black and white coloured left facing bearded male head, representing the ancient Greek god Zeus. The god is wearing a laurel wreath in his hair and holds a lightning bolt in his left hand, with the word ZEUS beside it. The artwork has been applied over the original Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) lower fuselage light ghost grey camouflage paint (FS 36375). Original RAAF applied ghost grey coloured stencils are to the rear and lower edge of the artwork: 'GUN HOLDBACK / INDICATOR' to the rear, and the numeral '6' on the lower edge.

On the morning of Monday 2 May 2016, flying out of Al-Dhafra Air Force Base in the United Arab Emirates as part of Operation Okra, RAAF F/A-18A Hornet A21-34 was conducting a Close Air Support mission over Northern Iraq against Daesh/ISIS forces. The pilot, Flight Lieutenant Michael Newby, was mid-way through his strikes when he flew through a very dark cloud. As he proceeded through it he 'felt a slight jolt and saw what I thought was a static discharge spark across the canopy (roughly from grab handle to grab handle). My initial thought that it was just a static discharge spark was because we'd seen a lot of Saint Elmo's fire by night. With that on my mind I re-checked that the data in the weapon was correct and I continued with the attack'. Upon landing Newby informed his ground crew of the incident but an initial post-flight inspection found nothing abnormal.

It was not until ground crew started to refuel the jet for its next mission that they noticed 'a fountain of fuel' coming out of one of the external fuel tanks. At this point they went over the entire aircraft with a 'fine toothed comb' and found 32 lightning induced arc points on the upper fusealge, ranging from melted metal to a small portion of carbon fibre broken out of the speed brake.

The Zeus artwork was designed and applied by Avionics Technician Leading Aircraftman Patrick Kelly. He completed it on 16 June 2016 using paint pens. Kelly had been the one who had discovered the lightning damage, and had already created nose art for three Hornets on his rotation. Zeus was chosen as the subject for Hornet A21-34 as he was the ancient Greek god of the sky and thunder. Kelly drew at least 25 versions of the design before his fellow ground crew selected the best one. The drawing was then passed to a junior officer for consideration, then to the commanding officer, who consulted the squadron's pilots before the image was finally approved. Kelly's first efforts at nose art had been undertaken with chinagraph pencil, partly selected because it could be easily removed. However, the pencils were difficult to use because the heat in Iraq, even at night time, meant that the pencil softened and was difficult to apply with any accuracy. For the Zeus artwork Kelly selected paint pencils, again under the impression that any image could be easily removed. This proved not to be the case as the paint baked hard on the fuselage surface.

Like Kelly's previous nose art, Zeus had to applied to the aircraft at night during a four hour window when the aircraft's skin was cool enough to take the paint. Although the area was brightly lit the squadron's Hornets were parked on an apron with the port side facing away from the runway, and consquently in shadow. Kelly and his assistant used a handheld torch and light from a towing tractor to undertake the artrwork.

During an Australian War Memorial staff visit to the Middle East in late 2016 curators were advised that Hornet A21-34 would shortly be returning to Australia, and that the Zeus nose art would be removed from it as part of standard RAAF procedures. The RAAF Task Group Commander gave permission for the panel to be removed so that it could become part of the Memorial's national collection. It was added to the collection in 2018.

A21-34 was delivered to the RAAF on 20 July 1988 and served with several units of the RAAF including 2 Operational Conversion Unit, 75 Squadron and 3 Squadron, in both training and operational roles.