Paging the aircraft anoraks

After a bit of frantic Google-earthing in another place, involving
looking at the flight decks of aircraft carriers, we were discussing
large planes and operating them off carriers.

I was surprised to read that the US Navy considered operating an F111
variant at one point, but even more surprising is this:

http://www.theaviationzone.com/factsheets/c130_forrestal.asp?

Fucking hell.... no catapult and no arrestor wire. That took some guts.
Check out the video clips.

(I've checked google and can't find any previous reference to this in
here)

 

I've since discovered that the A5 'Vigilante' is even bigger than an
F111. I'd say it must be a bit hairy landing one of those on a carrier
deck. Although they do appear to employ the arrestor wire.

Heh - it's still a bloody big and heavy plane to set down on a carrier,
though. It appears they could land it, and take off from where they
landed, so yeah, I suppose it is a doddle.... apart from the 15ft
clearance between the wing-tip and island. Not much room for error,
there.

Quite impressive stuff.

 

Fark me. Impressive.

I still think the original Doolittle Raid, getting B25 Mitchells off a
WW2-sized carrier, was more impressive - or loony - though.

 

Aye, I was just going to mention that, especially considering the deck
was half filled with B25s as well, so there wasn't even a full run up.

 

Yeah, bloody impressive, that - would have been even more impressive if
they could have landed them again, but I suppose that would have been
pushing their luck more than a bit.

 

Indeed, I doubt the under carriage would have taken the landing anyway.

 

Don't they take off in about 2 fag papers anyway (with some sort of boosters
strapped to the sides) ?

 

Yeah, JATO bottles
http://www.flymcaa.org/orgs/mcaa.nsf/0/eaaa70619723c31e80256a15004285af?OpenDocument

 

It was the landing that impressed me more.

 

There's a link to a video of them doing just that, on the right-hand
side of the page.

And better still, a link to the rocket-assisted stop, which went badly
wrong when the retro-rockets fired too early.

 

Oh Yeah !

*Snort*, trust the septics.

 

Why? Landing a heavy plane on a carrier should be slightly easier than
putting down on tarmac or grass, since there is a small cushioning
effect as the hull is floating.

How you'd stop the thing and all its mates is a different matter entirely.

 

The message <Zv1Kf.47845$>

JATOs?

I suppose you could mount some as retros.

 

Ever seen a C130 with rocket assist take off? It is Kewl. And bloody loud,
TAAW.

Ali

 

Would that make any difference? An aircraft carrier would have rather a
lot of inertia for it to bob about much I'd have thought.

 

Yes, that was the problem I was thinking of. If the carrier surges
upwards as the plane is about to touch down, then the force on the
under-carriage will be increased greatly. It is usually a design feature
of carrier aircraft design that they have strengthened under-carriage.

 

That's the one, and at a guess, why the article talked about sea
conditions.

 

Isn't this the sort of thing that Hercs are supposed to be able to do
anyway?

 

Getting the **** out of Dodge with extreme prejudice. Nitrous for Fat
Alberts.

Terms like SNAFU and FUBAR spring to mind.

 

I know they're very capable of taking off and landing on very short
runways, they just seemed a little on the large side for carrier based
operations.