Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!lethe!yunexus!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!apple!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!cbnews!cbnews!military
From: gwh%soda.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (George William Herbert)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: "Stealth" Bombers
Summary: F-117 radar detection?
Keywords: F-117 Stealth Radar
Message-ID: <1991Jan23.044226.7926@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 23 Jan 91 04:42:26 GMT
References: <1991Jan21.041430.5413@cbnews.att.com>
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
Organization: UCB Open Access Computing
Lines: 29
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: gwh%soda.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (George William Herbert)

In article <1991Jan21.041430.5413@cbnews.att.com> ar73+@andrew.cmu.edu (Aymerik Renard) writes:
>    The B-2 is the stealth bomber. The F-117A is the stealth fighter.
>It's also interesting to note that the F-117A can be detected by radars
>on some of the Mirage planes.

Do you have a source on that?

>From my understanding of it, it's stealthy in 2 ways: one, it's flat surfaces
have a near-zero radar return at any frequency (except at radar wavelength
approaching the plane's size...) unless viewed directly perpendicularly.  The
second way is that those flat plates are also covered with Radar Absorbent
Material of various types and thicknesses, that reduces the return from a
flat-plate perpendicular return to less than a normal aircraft would return 
anyway.

I've read a lot of sources and not seen anything that indicated that it was
radar-visible at any frequency below long-wavelength radars.  I welcome a 
correction, but i'd like to see the source on the info. 8-)


  == George William Herbert ==   * UNIX ate my last .sig, Waiting for Plan 9! *
 == JOAT for Hire: Anything, ==  #########  I do Naval Architecture, ##########
===+++ Anywhere, my price +++=== # Spacecraft Design, UNIX Systems Consulting #
 ==  gwh@soda.berkeley.edu   ==  # RPG writing/development, and lots of other #
  ==  gwh@ocf.berkeley.edu  ==   ## random stuff, of course.  I'm a JOAT 8-) ##