Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!cbnews!military
From: rmiller@i88.isc.com (Richard J. Miller)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Air considerations in Iraq
Message-ID: <1990Aug14.034559.10897@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 14 Aug 90 03:45:59 GMT
References: <1990Aug8.030420.25701@cbnews.att.com>
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
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From: rmiller@i88.isc.com (Richard J. Miller)
In article <1990Aug8.030420.25701@cbnews.att.com> wb9omc@ea.ecn.purdue.edu (Duane P Mantick) writes:
>
>
>From: wb9omc@ea.ecn.purdue.edu (Duane P Mantick)
...
>I would think it would be prudent to perform a night strike with the
>F117a and some Anti Radiation Missiles, which could home in on the
>radar pulses emitted by  the SAM radar and blast it, rendering the
>whole thing useless.  We spent mega-bucks for these little guys
>(the Nighthawks, that is) and I think it is about time we get some
>of our investment returned by demostrating what they can REALLY do.

a friend of mine saw a news report on 8/8 that said 117s were in place
in Saudi after being airlifted by C-5s (3 or 4 117s to a 5)

...
>BTW, it would not surprise me to find that the F117a can be recovered
>on an aircraft carrier, but possibly not launched.  In the material
>I am looking at these days I keep seeing references to a "tail hook"
>that is ostensibly for runway cable arrests.  However, it would not
>surprise me to find out that the same "tail hook" could also allow the
>F117A to make a carrier landing - I would say though, it doesn't look
>like the gear are carrier-optimized, so rough seas would probably rule
>that out.
...
>Duane

i would be VERY surprised if you could land a 117 on a carrier. i saw
the one on static at Osh Kosh, and it certainly did NOT have a 25G
landing gear on it like the Tomcat across the display area did. and
secondly, the 117 used a chute to slow down on landing. the only other
aircraft in the US inventory that does that routinely is the B-52
(please recall that the SR-71 is retired, and a friend of mine who used
to drive 52s says that the B-1 does not have a chute). requiring a chute
likely means that the 117 would have a VERY hard time hitting a carrier
at ANY convenient speed, and certainly not the 140 knots that the Navy
likes to see. remember that a tail hook doesn't mean carrier capable,
just that it has a hook (check out some Navy training bases and you may
find arrestor cables in the overrun areas of a couple of the runways,
Springfield, Illinois used to have some, they had a Guard squadron).

the F-117a is a very interesting aircraft, but designing carrier
capability is asking a bit much for a first generation stealth
aircraft. it's low speed (for landing) handling is probably real touchy.

Rich Miller
rmiller@i88.isc.com
{sun, amdahl, att (maybe)}!laidbak!rmiller