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iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
Yeah in all seriousness pretty sure the last time the USAF (or the US military as a whole) dropped an unguided bomb in a combat situation was maaaaybe during the initial invasion of Iraq in '03, and even that was probably just to use up some CBU-87s without burning up a WCMD tailkit while were shock 'n' awe'ing some shithole Iraqi town or something. If you want to go back to the last conflict in which unguided munitions made up more than a fraction of a percent of the total muns dropped it'd be Allied Force in the late '90s, and if you want to have it be where unguided munitions were a majority of the bombs dropped it'd be Desert Storm, which was over a quarter of a century ago.

e: just looking at that scenario in a vacuum without any context to what happened prior to the weapon release call, I find it hard to believe it wasn't type 1 or (more likely) type 2 control...which basically means short of aircrew fat fingering coordinates into the JDAM, that one most likely falls on the JTAC.

iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 05:49 on Feb 23, 2016

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iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

lol

gonna hafta do that with our Preds before I leave

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

Landing somewhere green? Does not compute.

if it was an AK (or even ZZ) tail maybe

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

The Unified Commands do not fall under the Joint Chiefs. I didn't notice Dempsey in the NSC line, but you're right about that. He shouldn't be in the diagonal line though, if this is a chain of command representation.

IIRC the explanation is something along the lines of "while he's not in the formal chain of command, CJCS reviews all the assassination targeted killing strike requests from the CCMD's prior to forwarding to the SECDEF."

Of course because it's DRONZ all the reporting is colossally stupid from top to bottom anyway

Buca di Bepis posted:

That has to be the most retarded way to graphically represent a chain of command I've ever seen

It's because it's not a formal chain of command, it's the approval process for assassination targeted killings...which is extremely convoluted.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
Yeah it was a Whiskey Cobra (two blade rotor)...the four blade effect was from the frame rate

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
Armadillo is about Danish troops in Afghanistan, similar in feel/tone to Restrepo, pretty sure it's on Netflix streaming

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

ded posted:

Wouldn't those old f-15c be in need of new airframes too?

Everyone knows the only realistic option for air superiority is bootstrapping our existing -C model fleet to backstop the Raptors. Which means everyone knows and accepts we're going to have to, at a minimum, do a structural SLEP at some point. It's just a question of how many other toys we hang on the airframe when we do that (we're already putting V3 radars on the rest of the fleet, there's the Talon HATE datalink, new EW suite, the quad-pack missile racks, etc)

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Radical 90s Wizard posted:

Fuuuuuck where have I been, when did gfx get so good?? that's ridiculous

HD MQ-9 footage is pretty sweet

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Dead Reckoning posted:

$50,000 bomb. JFC, I'd like to at least see some secondaries for that sort of outlay. "Disrupt illicit financial operations"? What the gently caress is this, guys.

Looked like a Hellfire to me.

Which means it was a $100,000+ shot.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Booblord Zagats posted:

If it's the old anti-armor hellfire, those only cost about 45k adjusted iirc

We've long since expended all of those (at least the ones that were modded for RPA usage). The ones we're shooting now (various Romeo variants) are $100K+ a pop

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
Alternatively

http://youtubedoubler.com/?video1=h...Ayarkhaan+Enemy

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Buca di Bepis posted:

gonna guess the pilot actually got out of his seat to grab the nozzle and put it in

Godholio posted:

Probably the other guy, but yeah.

flip side view:



so yeah pretty much

Couple years later a group of guys (including a couple by the names of Ira Eaker, Carl Spaatz, and Pete Quesada) decided to utilize the same basic refueling technique to set an endurance record in a Fokker tri-motor called the Question Mark. Some of the specifics of the in-flight refueling operation were pretty :stare::

quote:

Both aircraft stabilized in level flight at 80 mph (130 km/h) and the hose was reeled out. Spaatz climbed on a platform below the open hatch, and wearing rain gear and goggles for protection against fuel spills, grounded the hose and then placed it in a receptacle mounted in the upper fuselage.
Made from a bucket with a sloped floor, the receptacle had connections to the two extra fuel tanks, and at Spaatz's signal Solter opened the valve. Fuel flowed by gravity into the bucket at 75 US gallons (280 L) per minute and then into the tanks, where it was then pumped by hand into the wing tanks by Hooe. Food, mail, tools, spare parts, and other supplies were also passed by rope in the same fashion.

quote:

During a refueling, Spaatz was drenched with fuel when turbulence caused the hose to pull out of the receptacle. Recalling the event in 1975, Eaker said:

"We went over the Rose Bowl. It was very bumpy, as you can appreciate, as we should have appreciated, up against those mountains in January, and the refueling plane and the Question Mark were torn apart. I was piloting the Question Mark and I realized that General Spaatz had probably been drenched in high octane gasoline."

Quesada was at the controls and flew the aircraft over the ocean for calmer air. Fearing that chemical burns from the gasoline might force him to parachute from the airplane to seek medical treatment, Spaatz ordered Eaker to continue the flight regardless. However Spaatz shed all his clothing and was wiped off with oil-soaked rags. Although he directed at least one refueling without his clothing, replacements were soon delivered. Quesada was briefly overcome by the same accident but quickly revived. Spaatz experienced two other fuel spills without injury, using oil to wipe his skin and zinc oxide to protect his eyes

They managed to stay aloft for 150 hours.

Which if we're talking endurance flights, is nothing compared to the current record holder....64 days in a Cessna 172. That airframe is actually hanging up in the baggage claim of McCarran, look it up the next time you're flying into Vegas.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
lol at the one solitary Pred in the upper right

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
CENTCOM PA needs to step up their game, we need some inspirational music and awesome sound effects in our strike videos too

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

holocaust bloopers posted:

Take away here is to not purchase CIA-operated aircraft.

yuuuuuuuup

someone probably should've gone to jail over the fact that those planes were put into the normal Boneyard rotation like they were a normal well-maintained AF tail instead of being cut up for beer cans the instant the CIA gave them back

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

WAR CRIME SYNDICAT posted:

From what I remember, it was also a lot higher on the flight hours than the (miniscule) records they had indicated.

yup, also did a shitload of low altitude/high stress maneuvering (basically what you would imagine an off the books CIA Herk spending its time doing)

combine that with the less than stellar maintenance it received while it was flying for the CIA (lol ISO/phase, what's that?) and you can see why it just disintegrated in midair

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

Yeah but that's actually normal. The whole thing was a non-issue from an aircraft development standpoint, the only real :stare: -worthy part was the USMC declaring it operational as insanely early as they did (for political reasons).

reminder that the USAF is going to declare IOC this year using the 3i OPF, which has the same weapons capes as the 2B that the USMC fielded with (go go GBU-12!). Although to be fair it is quite a bit more stable than 2B, and the 3i tails will at least have Tech Refresh 2 processors....so at least the USAF won't need to upgrade the processors on their tails to be 3F (FOC OFP) capable, unlike the Marines.

Also ALIS still doesn't work, so if the USAF is going to actually hold to their original requirements for IOC it's unlikely to make it before the threshold value of Dec '16. But lol if you think they'll do that.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

You're probably right, but if they wanted they could hold off without major repercussions at this point.

"without major repercussions" in the real world...yes. But busting threshold values means an APB breach, and that means bigwig PEOs have to go explain why they screwed up. So I am confident that they will be formally declaring IOC before the end of the year, even if the aircraft itself wouldn't be deployed in combat until well after 3F is fielded a couple years down the road.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

Missing milestones, budgets, and timetables have happened so often in this program the PEOs probably have reserved seats in the front row. But you're definitely right that it will be a non-factor for deployments either way...even if actually met IOC standards when they declare IOC, it wouldn't deploy yet.

True, but they haven't had a breach yet on the revised 2012 APB (except for a relatively minor RDT&E one on the engine in the first year that was due to an accounting error). Formally busting threshold value for schedule on the "new" APB would be a fairly significant deal I think because it would be a major black eye for the program since the 2012 APB is supposed to be the "no seriously guys, we've worked out the kinks and everything is on schedule now, no fakesies" baseline. Even if there's no way the system is ready to deploy yet (i.e., USMC last year), it's a lot easier to hand-wave away the bad press in that scenario than it is if you are staring at a black and white APB schedule breach.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Godholio posted:

Ah, I didn't realize there was a new roadmap. That makes sense.

lol under the original plan in 2001 they were supposed to have declared IOC for all three variants like by 2010 and be in FRP by 2012, under the first formally approved APB in 2007 they were supposed to declare IOC in 2012 and be in FRP by 2015. So yeah, saying they've rebaselined is putting it mildly.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

ded posted:

mopping in a storm sounds very marine


lol was just about to post that very picture

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

ghetto wormhole posted:

You wouldn't get me in that thing with all the airplanes flying around blowing stuff the gently caress up.

lol yeah I fully expect to see that thing on a Pred/Reaper Greatest Hits compilation within the next month

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Pesticide20 posted:

Should be the next GMC ad

"WE ARE: HAJI GRADE" doesn't have quite the same ring to it

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Booblord Zagats posted:

Turns out America owns pretty hard when you think about it

Proof

that museum really needs a BUFF

e: but the stained glass is real cool

e2: abu hajaar meets Col Hogan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMQwYYr-F2U

iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 03:25 on Aug 6, 2016

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

chitoryu12 posted:

I'm going to be leaving a New York City vacation and heading back to Orlando at the beginning of September, but we've got an extra day off work beyond what we were actually vacationing on. Are there any awesome military museums along that route other than Mighty 8th? I was already thinking about stopping there.

if you go through DC obviously the NASM on the Mall and Udvar-Hazy. There's also the National Museum of the Marine Corps at Quantico. Charleston has Patriots Point, with the Yorktown, Laffey, and some other ships.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

I've physically been on/around both where that cannon was emplaced and where the detonation was

getting to spend a day driving around the NTS/NNSA was pretty cool

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Saint Celestine posted:

They're firing HEAT missiles right? How effective are those against soft targets? I imagine the few people in the direct blast area are dead, but its not as effective as say, a thermobaric or HE warhead right?

it's relatively easy to add a frag sleeve to a HEAT warhead to get good fragmentation effects, which is really all you need against troops in the open. I'd imagine that is the majority of what's being supplied

VikingSkull posted:

gwtbw was so good

I'm going back and re-reading it now just because

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

chitoryu12 posted:

I doubt it. In a lot of the videos you see people who were right next to the blast get back up and start running, or they don't even fall to begin with.

welp based on my quick googling I don't think anyone has ever made a frag sleeve version of the TOW or Milan so ignore that point I guess

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

MassivelyBuckNegro posted:

javs too but neither warrant developing special heat-frag rounds to snipe dudes in a big war.

putting a frag sleeve around a HEAT round is really pretty simple, we've done it on Hellfires for years...the K models that had it first fielded in the '90s. I just figured someone along the way would've done it to other missiles as well

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

MassivelyBuckNegro posted:

i dont care what the syrians do. devloping a heat-frag tow round is stupid because your tow variants carry like 15 rounds max. in a real war, you're never shooting tows at dudes when you've gotta fight off the red hordes and you have 25mm he.

counterpoint would be we've been plinking dudes with $100,000 heat-frag Hellfires from a variety of platforms for the last 15 years

given the fact that it seems like TOWs and other ground based ATGMs were deployed relatively commonly in afghanistan/iraq over the last 15 years I'm honestly surprised that there isn't a frag sleeve variant out there since I would've figured someone had dropped a UON or JUON declaring it something they needed right now

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Saint Celestine posted:

Why HEAT-Frag? Why not just make a thermobaric TOW missile? The launcher's big enough.

The Kornet has one.

because you don't have to redesign the entire warhead. Making a heat-frag warhead is as simple as putting a frag sleeve around the heat warhead already in place (which is pretty easy) as opposed to putting a completely different thermobaric warhead on the missile

Also because you still have anti-armor/hard target capability....so instead of needing two missiles for two different target sets (thermobaric for soft targets/heat for armor) you've got one missile that does it all

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Kung Fu Fist gently caress posted:

is the hellfire the only thing that they make this vaunted frag sleeve for?

I think so yeah

which like I said, surprises me a bit because from a capability perspective it's pretty effective

I mean logically it doesn't make much sense for it to be on TOW (or any other anti-armor missile really) but given GWOT mentality and UON/JUON fun-bux I'm still a little surprised someone hasn't thrown money at it yet

Phanatic posted:

Is it? If the missile's tube-launched, the OD has to be smaller than the tube, so you can't just wrap a sleeve around the warhead section and still make it fit. You'd have to fit it internally, which means it's got to fit somewhere, which means you're probably designing a different warhead, one that integrates a fragmentation section, and putting it on the missile.

Good point...my only question would be how much clearance is there between the exterior surface of the missile and the tube? A light frag sleeve adds very little in diameter

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

go3 posted:

Can we just rejoice that we live in time where you can watch a platoon eat two TOWs

and then still stand around clueless

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Scratch Monkey posted:

I'm sort of surprised the Syrians haven't made their own junkyard frag sleeves yet.

insh'allah, we will destroy the infidels with our missiles brother

modifying ATGMs with frag sleeves is probably beyond comprehension for most of who we're talking about, this is a gang that thinks "use manual labor to haul 57mm gun to top of open building, then watch it get sniped by an ATGM" is the height of indirect fire support

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Reverand maynard posted:

So I'm not confused, a frag sleeve adds fragmentation to the entire length of the missile, yes?

no, it's typically just wrapped around the warhead section. This is a pretty good picture:



it's right where the middle yellow stripe is

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Hot Karl Marx posted:

Is it just simply a 'wrap' of metal with like perforation strips running longitudinally or something?

Or :nsa:?

this slideshow has some decent pictures of what one example looks like. Obviously there's a bunch of different approaches depending on your desired target effects....but that's about as specific as I'm comfortable getting about that.

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

there was a "behind the scenes" of this that someone (Vice I think) did on those guys. They're just so drat excited to be making movies

iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd

Nostalgia4Dicks posted:

so uh who are the bad guys again, the Saudis..? Comments say a lot of those dudes are from East Asia, Somalia, or poor Arab tribes and not actual Saudis

the Yemeni Civil War is one of those where you just wish everyone involved could go off on an island and kill each other so they could quit making so many innocent people's lives miserable, because there really aren't any good guys

the Saudi military is heavily involved directly in the conflict......along with most of the rest of the GCC (bunch of Emirati guys running around, I think the only GCC nation that hasn't sent troops is Oman) plus some other Arab countries like Egypt and Morocco. Also Sudan and Senegal, and some Colombian mercs working for Blackwater being paid for by the UAE.

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iyaayas01
Feb 19, 2010

Perry'd
I'm really struggling to understand how this happened. Even factoring in the ammonium nitrate airbag inflators are supposed to be considered Class 9, because they've gone through testing (by an independent agency, not the manufacturer) to verify that they aren't supposed to have any of the characteristics of Hazard Class 1 (explosives). Even the defective ones just deflagrated more rapidly than designed, which caused an over-pressure and the whole flinging of shrapnel into people's faces. They didn't detonate.

This poo poo was a loving mass detonation. Unless Takata has started packing their airbags with Tritonal this shouldn't have happened.

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