I gave a history of the company that built this plane (Macchi or Aermacchi, formed in 1912 in Varese, Lombardia, northern Italia), and of the airframe (it's a CA-30 built under licence by the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation in 1969, and it's A7-066 with A7-009's wing, not A7-025 as painted), but let's now talk about the model.

The real name of the aircraft is of course the MB-326, with CA-30 just being the licence name. Originally (from the time it first flew in December 1957 to its introduction to the Aeronautica Militare Italia (Italian Air Force) in February 1962) it was intended as a two seat trainer only. At that time there was a school of thought that it would be more economical to train jet pilots on jets from elementary to advanced training. (That idea never really caught on, because of course jets are more expensive to purchase and operate than a simple propeller powered plane.)

However the aircraft handled well enough that some single seat light ground attack versions were created. In all, over 20 versions were designed though not all were built.

The model used by Australia, the MB-326H, was similar to the MB-326G (a two seater trainer and ground attack aircraft), with improved avionics.

The MB-326G was 10.65m (34' 11") long with a wingspan of 10.85m (35' 7"), a wing area of 19.35 sqm (208.3 sq ft) and a maximum takeoff weight of 4,577kg (10,091 lb). It was powered by a single Bristol Siddeley Viper 20 turbojet engine giving 15.2 kN, a cruise speed of 430 knots (797 km/h) and a top speed of 468 knots (867 km/h) and a service ceiling of 46,998 ft. The operational range was 1,850km.

An armed version could have two 0.303 in machine guns fitted (which was a bit quaint, even by early 60's standards) as well as an assortment of pylon mounted gun pods. There were 6 hardpoints where you could fix rockets, missiles or bombs.

The Roulettes, Australia's version of the Blue Angels but a bit slower, flew the Macchi from the end of 1970 to the end of the 1980s. (They currently fly the Pilatus PC-21 turboprop.)

There was a single problem... the model suffered from structural fatigue, at least in Australia. There was an extension of life program in the 1980s, but many of them still needed to be re-winged in the 1990s after a fatigue related crash.

Safety remained a concern, which resulted in the accelerated adoption of the Pilatus PC-9 turboprop trainers. (The PC-21's predecessor.) By the start of the new century, the type was completely withdrawn in favour of the Hawk 127 jet trainer.

Addendum: My personal opinion is that Facebook is a sociopathic organisation that steals other peoples' intellectual property (including the images in this gallery) despite being explicitly denied permission to do so.