Osprey vs. Harrier

Brian Allardice wrote:
These damned things [Osprey} have been fluttering around for better than 30 years. How
long do you have to flog a dying concept for it to loose the "revolutionary"
label. Is that simply another way of saying "It doesn't bloody work yet"?
When was the last time someone called the Harrier 'revolutionary'? Of course,
the Harrier does work.....

Cheers,
dba

Very poor choice of plane to compare it to.

To quote a recent article:
"They know this drill all too well because the Harrier is the most
dangerous airplane flying in the U.S. military today.

Over the last three decades, it has amassed the highest rate of major
accidents of any Air Force, Navy, Army or Marine plane now in service.
Forty-five Marines have died in 143 noncombat accidents since the corps
bought the so-called jump jet from the British in 1971. More than a
third of the fleet has been lost to accidents.

The toll has been little noted by the public and the media because the
Harrier tends to kill pilots one at a time. In contrast, the V-22
Osprey, a problem-plagued troop transport plane, has killed as many as
19 Marines in a single crash.

The Harrier and the Osprey are the first two planes the Marine Corps has
acquired in pursuing its long-range vertical vision. A third plane is
under active development and several others are being conceived."
- http://www.latimes.com/news/specials...ier-day1.story

Please note I'm not knocking the Harrier.

Anytime you develop a totally new type of aircraft and have to also
develop new operational concepts you get fatal accidents. Go back and
review the early days of everything from the Harrier to the early jets
and helicopters.

Also note the operational requirements are inherently more dangerous
than, say, circumstances where you rarely, if ever, fly below several
thousand feet.

It's not that the Osprey is more dangerous or has resulted in more
fatalities than many of the older planes, it that we've become less
tolerant of failures during R&D T&E.

"Stephen D. Poe" wrote in message ...

To quote a recent article:
"They know this drill all too well because the Harrier is the most
dangerous airplane flying in the U.S. military today.

Over the last three decades, it has amassed the highest rate of major
accidents of any Air Force, Navy, Army or Marine plane now in service.
Forty-five Marines have died in 143 noncombat accidents since the corps
bought the so-called jump jet from the British in 1971. More than a
third of the fleet has been lost to accidents.

As a matter of interest, how does that compare with the accident rate
experienced with conventional naval/marine planes flying from
carriers?

Tony Williams
Military gun and ammunition website: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk
Discussion forum at: http://forums.delphiforums.com/autogun/messages/

(Tony Williams) wrote in message

As a matter of interest, how does that compare with the accident rate
experienced with conventional naval/marine planes flying from
carriers?

And how do USMC accident rates compare to UK accident rates in their
respective harrier fleets? I don't think the RAF or Royal Navy Fleet
Air Arm lose that many aircraft.

What we do know is that the harrier replacement (JSF) will incorporate
innovations to reduce v-stol pilot workload currently under
development here in the UK. A Harrier prototype has been fitted with
fly-by-wire controls and a flight management computor capable of
practically landing the plane automatically - the most dangerous
regime of v-stol flight. Controlling parameters like nozzle angle,
thrust, pitch, speed, landing gear etc the computor can land the
aircraft from approach configuration with one button push from the
pilot. Maybe this kind of thinking could be applied to the V-22?

Benjym

"benjym" wrote:

What we do know is that the harrier replacement (JSF) will
incorporate
innovations to reduce v-stol pilot workload currently under
development here in the UK. A Harrier prototype has been fitted
with
fly-by-wire controls and a flight management computor capable of
practically landing the plane automatically - the most dangerous
regime of v-stol flight. Controlling parameters like nozzle angle,
thrust, pitch, speed, landing gear etc the computor can land the
aircraft from approach configuration with one button push from the
pilot. Maybe this kind of thinking could be applied to the V-22?

When the V-22 Osprey is landing combat grunts on a hot LZ, do you
really want a computer landing the aircraft slowly and safely? If
not, how and when do you train the pilot to land quickly under those
circumstances?

"Felger Carbon" wrote:

:When the V-22 Osprey is landing combat grunts on a hot LZ, do you
:really want a computer landing the aircraft slowly and safely? If
:not, how and when do you train the pilot to land quickly under those
:circumstances?

Well, there is actually some question whether it CAN be landed quickly
under ANY circumstances that aren't called a crash.

--
"Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."
-- Charles Pinckney

Felger Carbon wrote:

"benjym" wrote:

What we do know is that the harrier replacement (JSF) will

incorporate

innovations to reduce v-stol pilot workload currently under
development here in the UK. A Harrier prototype has been fitted

with

fly-by-wire controls and a flight management computor capable of
practically landing the plane automatically - the most dangerous
regime of v-stol flight. Controlling parameters like nozzle angle,
thrust, pitch, speed, landing gear etc the computor can land the
aircraft from approach configuration with one button push from the
pilot. Maybe this kind of thinking could be applied to the V-22?


When the V-22 Osprey is landing combat grunts on a hot LZ, do you
really want a computer landing the aircraft slowly and safely? If
not, how and when do you train the pilot to land quickly under those
circumstances?

Why not let the computer(s) land it quickly and safely? A trite comment
admittedly but if you have a philosophical problem with automation
rather than knowledge of the actual technical difficulties then consider
that "driver aids" in racing cars allow the drivers to extract
considerably more performance from their vehicles and be far more
aggressive with them than if they had no help. You are right to allude
to training needs. If you're going to automate something then it had
better work under all likely circumstances, because otherwise its
dominant effect is to adversely impact operator currency for occasions
when it really matters. I suspect that in the "hot LZ" situation you
describe that you'd want a pilot controlling things, with automation to
keep everything within controllable limits. The pilot can then do what
humans do well, assess the situation, make decisions and innovate,
whilst being spared the jobs we're not so good at, like keeping a
variety of little instrument needles out of a variety of red-zones
whilst being shot at.

(Tony Williams) wrote:

:"Stephen D. Poe" wrote in message ...
:
: To quote a recent article:
: "They know this drill all too well because the Harrier is the most
: dangerous airplane flying in the U.S. military today.
:
: Over the last three decades, it has amassed the highest rate of major
: accidents of any Air Force, Navy, Army or Marine plane now in service.
: Forty-five Marines have died in 143 noncombat accidents since the corps
: bought the so-called jump jet from the British in 1971. More than a
: third of the fleet has been lost to accidents.
:
:As a matter of interest, how does that compare with the accident rate
:experienced with conventional naval/marine planes flying from
:carriers?

AV-8 12/100,000 flight hours
F/A-18 3/100,000 flight hours

So the AV-8 accident rate is about 4 times higher than conventional
carrier air. To put things further in perspective, over 2/3 of the
AV-8 accidents are mechanicals and less than 1/3 are pilot error.
Reverse that for most other carrier aircraft (around 2/3 of the
accidents are pilot error).

Looking at those numbers, what you see is that the pilot error rate
for the AV-8 is around twice what it is in the F/A-18 (an aircraft
noted for the heavy workload it imposes on the pilot - a significant
number (in fact it's the highest single cause) of F/A-18 Class A
accidents are CFIT). So the AV-8 is significantly harder to fly. You
also see a mechanical accident rate of something like eight times that
of the F/A-18, so the AV-8 is *hugely* less reliable. This is
probably only to be expected from the significantly more mechanically
complex AV-8 (hover is hard), particularly given the much older engine
technology and the fact that there is only one engine.

As a benchmark, the old F-8 Crusader used to run an accident rate of
around 14/100,000 flight hours.

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to
live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Dryden

"Stephen D. Poe" wrote

"They know this drill all too well because the Harrier is the most
dangerous airplane flying in the U.S. military today.

Correction on behalf of Peter Rieden and co:

"The Harrier is flown by some of the most dangerous pilots in the U.S.
military today."

On 8 Aug 2003 04:42:50 -0700, (Moggycat) wrote:

"Stephen D. Poe" wrote

"They know this drill all too well because the Harrier is the most
dangerous airplane flying in the U.S. military today.

Correction on behalf of Peter Rieden and co:

"The Harrier is flown by some of the most dangerous pilots in the U.S.
military today."

It's a training problem - marines don't have to take perisher.
____

Peter Skelton

Peter Skelton wrote:

:On 8 Aug 2003 04:42:50 -0700, (Moggycat) wrote:
:
:Correction on behalf of Peter Rieden and co:
:
:"The Harrier is flown by some of the most dangerous pilots in the U.S.
:military today."
:
:It's a training problem - marines don't have to take perisher.

Then explain how over 2/3 of the major accidents are mechanical
failures and not human failures, if it's a pilot training problem.

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to
live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Dryden