Bayou Renaissance Man

A very worrying report indicates that airliners may be vulnerable to a clash of technologies that might "mask" dangerously low altitudes.

French investigation authority BEA believes the prevalence of ILS approaches has obscured an underlying vulnerability of aircraft to the risk of terrain collision arising from incorrect altimeter pressure settings.

BEA made the remarks following its inquiry into a serious incident in which an Airbus A320 descended to just 6ft above ground during a low-visibility approach to Paris Charles de Gaulle’s runway 27R.

The ILS was not operational on the day of the incident, 23 May 2022, and the Airhub aircraft (9H-EMU) was conducting a satellite-based approach with barometric vertical guidance.

But BEA found the pilots had set the altimeter reference to 1011mb instead of 1001mb, after being given an incorrect QNH pressure reading by an air traffic controller. This resulted in the jet’s flying a descent path which was 280ft below the required profile.

Although this triggered a minimum safe altitude warning in the control tower, the controller took 9s to inform the crew – by which time the jet was 122ft above ground – and then used incorrect phraseology. The crew did not hear this call, and continued to descend.

BEA says the approach lights had not been switched on, and heavy rain meant the windshield wipers were operating at maximum speed.

After passing what they believed to be the decision height – but with the jet actually much lower, just 52ft above ground – the pilots initiated a go-around, because they had no visual contact with the runway.

The aircraft descended to 6ft, while 0.9nm from the threshold, before climbing away.

There's more at the link.

That's frightening as hell to anyone who flies frequently.  Basically, the aircrew entered an incorrect value, but did not double-check it;  and then they relied on the aircraft's technology, now mislead by their entry, to keep them safe.  It's only by the grace of God and a couple of seconds' leeway that they didn't fly their airliner straight into the ground, killing everyone aboard.

We're seeing this more and more;  aircrew relying on technology to fly the plane rather than doing so themselves.  Automation has become so advanced (?) and so complex that it's easier to simply set a computer to do what you want, then sit back and let the computer figure out how to do it.  If incorrect values have been entered, and the computer uses them in its calculations, you have no way of knowing that the danger exists.

As another example of relying on technology rather than pilot skill and concentration, consider the crash of Asiana Airlines Flight 214 in 2013.

The Asiana pilots said in interviews with the National Transportation Safety Board that they had set the auto-throttles to maintain an air speed of 137 knots. That’s a significantly faster speed than the plane actually achieved as it came in for its landing at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday.

. . .

The pilots’ statements do not resolve the central question of why the Boeing 777’s speed and altitude fell so far out of the normal range for landing at SFO before it hit a sea wall and crash-landed. But outside air safety experts said the statements suggest a risky reliance on technology when the flight crew should have been constantly monitoring the airplane’s speed.

“Whether it was engaged or not working is almost irrelevant,” said Barry Schiff, a former TWA pilot and an air safety consultant. “The big mystery of Flight 214 is why in God’s name did these two pilots sit there and allow the air speed to get so low.”

Experts said the pilots should have been monitoring the plane’s speed every few seconds, and could have manually taken control of the engines at any time.

Again, more at the link.

The first report gives me the shivers.  Six feet off the ground???  Oy gevalt . . .

Peter

From reader HistoryPerson, commenting on a CNN report about the Boeing Starliner crew capsule, currently docked with the International Space Station pending resolution of several issues with its thrusters and other components:

How many Boeing people does it take to change a light bulb? The answer is unknown because nobody at Boeing knows how to change a light bulb.

Considering how much trouble the Boeing 737 Max airliner program is in, that might be all too appropriate . . .  Remember when Boeing blazed the trail that all other aircraft manufacturers followed?  How are the mighty fallen!

Peter

It's been announced that Russia's Air Force will retire its last remaining Antonov An-22 strategic transport aircraft this year.  The photograph below shows the prototype aircraft at the Paris Air Show in 1965, the year it first flew.

The An-22 was a behemoth.  It could carry up to 80 metric tons (approximately 88 US tons) of cargo, roughly equivalent to today's Boeing C-17 Globemaster III and almost twice the payload by weight of the contemporary Lockheed C-141 Starlifter.  It was routinely used to ferry intercontinental ballistic missiles around the Soviet Union, as well as carry large, heavy cargoes to favored client nations.  It was the largest turboprop-powered aircraft ever built, using the same engines that powered the Tupolev Tu-95 strategic bomber.

The An-22 was regarded by the Soviet Union as a strategic asset due to its missile-ferrying duties, which led to a potentially serious incident back in 1975.  At the time, the Soviet Union was pouring armaments and surrogate forces into Angola to support its favored MPLA "liberation movement" (a.k.a. terrorist organization).  South Africa, with US encouragement, was at the same time intervening on behalf of another such organization, UNITA.  I'm informed by sources I consider reliable that in late 1975, some South African special forces were camped out within sight of the runways at the international airport in Luanda.  They managed to get their hands on a number of man-portable ground-to-air missiles (presumably taking them off MPLA forces that "no longer needed them"), and sent an excited signal back to South Africa saying that they planned to sneak up to the runway and shoot down as many as possible of the parade of An-22's arriving every day, filled with armaments.  They would have been "sitting duck" targets, having no alternative airport within range to which they could be diverted after their long flight down the African continent.

I'm told that this was mentioned in passing between a South African liaison officer and the US embassy in Pretoria, and led to seismic-level upheavals.  The CIA was convinced that if South Africa shot down some of the Soviet Union's scarce strategic transports (only 68 were ever built), the Soviets would react very harshly, escalating the war in Angola out of control, and would probably act against other important US client states around the world.  The reconnaissance forces near Luanda were duly told not to carry out their plan, but to allow the An-22's to arrive and depart undisturbed.  They were bitterly disappointed, and I was told that some of the signals they sent back to Pretoria were "sulfurous" - but they obeyed orders.  I've often wondered what would have happened if two or three of these monster aircraft had bitten the African dust . . .

As far as I know, there's only one An-22 flying outside the Russian Air Force, a privately-owned example operated by Antonov Airlines of Ukraine.  I don't know whether it's still operational.  To give you some idea of the enormous size of this plane, here are two video clips showing its arrival and departure at European airports.

So, at last, a giant of the skies goes to its rest.  It will not be forgotten.

Peter

If you said it was a Boeing B-29 Superfortress, you'd be wrong.  It's actually a Tupolev TU-4, an early Soviet-era carbon copy of a B-29, right down to a few combat scars that were slavishly copied from the three B-29's the Soviet Union had available when Josef Stalin ordered its development.

The story of how the Soviet Union copied the B-29 is a long and fascinating one.  You'll find all the details at the "WWIIafterWWII" blog.  Here's an excerpt.

The Soviet Union developed any number of highly effective fighters, ground attack planes, trainers, and twin-engined tactical bombers during WWII. One effort where the Soviets were far behind by the end of the war was strategic bombers. During WWII the USSR had only one (relatively) modern four-engined strategic bomber, the Pe-8.

Less than 100 were completed during WWII. They achieved little while suffering horrendous losses. By the time of Japan’s surrender in September 1945 there were only three dozen Pe-8s remaining. When NATO formed in 1949, they were considered so insignificant that they never even received a reporting name.

Throughout WWII, Josef Stalin sought to obtain American strategic bombers via Lend-Lease; with no success. As soon as Soviet intelligence became aware of the B-29 Superfortress, that type was requested as well. In 1944 the USA rejected the request, along with another attempt later that year and a third request in 1945. The USA considered the Superfortress such an advanced weapon that the requests were barely even given consideration.

. . .

The Soviet Union interned three B-29 Superfortresses during WWII. Until August 1945, the USSR had a non-aggression pact with Japan. Under international law, warplanes of warring parties landing in a neutral third country are required to be interned for the rest of the conflict.

“Ramp Tramp II” landed near Vladivostok on 29 July 1944, after taking an AA hit during a mission over Manchukuo. The damage was not severe but bad enough to make a return home impossible.

“General H.H. Arnold Special” landed at Tsentral’naya naval airbase on the USSR’s Pacific coast on 11 November 1944, after a storm blew it off course during a raid on the Omura aircraft factory in Japan.

“Ding Hao” landed at the same place ten days later after a Japanese AA round hit one of it’s engines. Of the three, it was the most significantly damaged.

All three of these B-29s were airworthy.

. . .

The idea for reverse-engineering the B-29 came not from Andrei Tupolev’s bureau, but rather from Vladimir Myasischchev, who ran his own aircraft design bureau. After the third B-29 was secured during WWII, Myasischchev suggested to Stalin that it would be both feasible and advantageous to reverse-engineer it. Stalin agreed, but for whatever reason, assigned the effort to his rival Tupolev in June 1945.

There's much more at the link, including many photographs.

I'd known about the TU-4 copy of the B-29 for a long time, but this article went into far greater depth than anything I'd read before.  It makes fascinating reading for aviation and military history buffs.  Recommended reading.

Peter

I think several people have every reason to celebrate this weekend.  First off, in Australia, a light aircraft carrying a family experienced engine failure, and made a skin-of-their-teeth landing at a local airport - missing trees and rooftops by literally inches.  (A tip o' the hat to Australian reader Andrew for sending me the link to this video report.)

The pilot appears to be a former South African, like myself - his name and accent are unmistakeable.  Kudos to him for a remarkable (and very fortunate) piece of piloting.

Next, closer to home, a skydiving flight narrowly avoided tragedy.

A pilot and six passengers on a skydiving flight jumped from a small plane just before the aircraft crashed in a Missouri field on Saturday, according to federal authorities.

The single-engine Cessna U206C crashed at about 1 p.m. near the Butler Memorial Airport, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) told Fox News Digital in a statement. 

The agency said preliminary information indicates the plane was flying a “skydiving mission,” and that the pilot and all passengers escaped the plane before the crash.

. . .

Paramedics treated the pilot and passengers at the scene before they were all released, the sheriff’s office said.

First responders found the aircraft wreckage in a hayfield east of the airport’s runways, according to the sheriff’s office, which described the plane as a “total loss.”

There's more at the link.

This accident surprised me because the pilot was wearing a parachute.  Skydiving pilots often don't wear one, partly due to space considerations (they typically cram as many skydivers as possible into the aircraft, leaving minimal room for the pilot) and partly because it usually takes time to get all the skydivers out of the plane, so that in an emergency, the pilot might not have time to get out himself.  (To illustrate, a recent Swiss skydiving aircraft accident killed the pilot.)  Congratulations to all concerned on their survival, and to the pilot on being more than usually safety-conscious.

I've flown many thousands of miles in single-engine light aircraft, bopping around the African continent;  and my wife learned to fly in Alaska, and knows what it's like to land on sandbars, moraines, tundra and other "interesting" surfaces.  We both have a lively appreciation for the dangers and difficulties involved in using small aircraft.  In both these cases, we're very glad that nobody was harmed.

Peter

A report at The War Zone brought back many military (and other) memories.

After an extraordinary career spanning more than 80 years of service, and plenty of operational missions, the South African Air Force (SAAF) is preparing to retire its last C-47 Dakotas. Remarkably, the SAAF is moving to discard its C-47s while, at the same time, elsewhere around the globe, turboprop versions of the venerable transport continue to win orders.

The story of the Dakota in SAAF service stretches all the way back to 1943 when the service was fighting in World War Two. Most extraordinary, perhaps, is that among the very last Dakotas operated by the SAAF, most had been delivered during that conflict, having started life as C-47s manufactured for the U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF).

By June next year the South African Air Force will have been operating C-47 Dakotas continuously for 80 years, albeit much upgraded. Even more astounding is that some airframes still in active service have been there from the start, with the oldest (6825) delivered in Feb 1944.

The SAAF’s Dakota fleet, however, saw its most extensive combat service during the long-running conflict in South West Africa (now known as Namibia) and Angola, supporting South African Defence Force (SADF) units during the so-called Border War between 1966 and 1989. The SADF relied heavily on the Dakota for troop transport, resupply, medical evacuation, paratrooping, and other missions, its importance was heightened by the sanctions on Apartheid South Africa that complicated the procurement of alternative equipment.

By the 1980s, the SAAF operated the largest fleet of Dakotas anywhere in the world — close to 50 in total. However, the demise of minority rule in South Africa, and the end of the Border War, saw the Dakota — and the SAAF more generally — switch increasingly to peacetime missions, especially humanitarian work. At the same time, Dakota squadrons were rationalized, and the fleet was reduced in size.

There's more at the link.

The SAAF's C-47's flew in combat zones many times over the years.  They were the primary transport for secondary military air routes in South Africa and then-South West Africa (today Namibia), with C-130's and C-160's handling the busier routes.  During the Rhodesian War many SAAF C-47's and Alouette III helicopters were "loaned" to Rhodesia, supplementing that country's small Air Force for "Fireforce" anti-terrorist missions and cross-border operations into Zambia and Mozambique.  During South Africa's own Border War in the 1980's they were the shorter-range backbone of air transport operations, including one (shown below) that had an argument with a SA-7 Strela anti-aircraft missile and barely made it back to an airport in time to avoid crashing.

I flew many thousands of miles aboard SAAF C-47's, including one that was so old its logbook recorded it dropping paratroopers at Arnhem in 1944 as part of Operation Market Garden - the so-called "Bridge Too Far" airborne assault.  It was in remarkably good shape for an aircraft that had been "rode hard and put away wet" for almost 40 years by the time I flew in it.  That particular aircraft is still in service, having been converted to turboprop propulsion along with the SAAF's other surviving C-47's.  I also traveled aboard the civilian DC-3 transports of Air Cape, flying along the Garden Route to and from Cape Town.  Even in the 1980's, dirt and grass airfields were still in use at some of the small towns there, with no all-weather runways.  Things could get bouncy during takeoff and landing, and occasionally the pilot would have to make a couple of low passes to chase a cow or two off the runway before he could land!

The SAAF Museum still has a flying example of the C-47 as built, with its original Pratt & Whitney engines.  Here's its C-47 showing off at an air display.  It's not a very good video, but it's the best I could find on YouTube.

I wonder what the SAAF will buy to replace its C-47's?  There's no doubt that it needs a replacement, both for transport and for coastal maritime reconnaissance (both roles currently filled by the C-47), but the SAAF's aircraft fleet is in very parlous condition at present, with a minimal budget and very few skilled maintainers left to keep it flying.  The service is a pale shadow of what it was in the 1980's, when it was undoubtedly the premier air force in sub-Saharan Africa, with skills and operational experience on a par with most NATO air arms.

Despite its age and long overdue need for replacement, it'll be sad to see the last of the SAAF's C-47's take a final bow and retire into history.

Peter

I was intrigued to read an article at The Aviationist.

65 years ago today on April 24, 1959, legend has it that an aviation stunt so bizarre it defies belief actually took place in the Mackinaw Straits between the upper and lower peninsulas of Michigan.

A U.S. Air Force RB-47E Stratojet reconnaissance aircraft piloted by Strategic Air Command pilot Capt. John Stanley Lappo was said to have flown underneath the Mackinaw Bridge where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron converge. As history records the event, no photos of the aircraft flying under the bridge exist, but the stunt, if it actually did happen, created enough buzz that a legend was born.

According to the thisdayinaviation.com website and the Wikipedia page for the Mackinaw Bridge, fitting a Boeing RB-47E Stratojet under the Mighty Mac was a tight squeeze with little margin for error. The highest place between the water surface in the Mackinaw Strait and the bottom of the Mackinaw Bridge is 155-feet at the center. The tail of an RB-47E stands 27-feet, 11 inches off the ground. If you do the math, that leaves about 127-feet of space between the water and the bottom of the bridge to play with. Considering the RB-47E stall speed in these conditions may have been as slow as 150-190 MPH, the plane would cover that distance in altitude in just over a second or two.

As the story goes, and is told in several media outlets, Capt. Lappo was, “Reported by his navigator” to some higher authority after the bridge fly-under. The legend claims that Lappo was, “charged with violating a regulation prohibiting flying an aircraft below 500-feet”. No great aviation tale is complete without details, and the story is that Capt. Lappo was permanently removed from flight status by the Commanding General of the Eight Air Force, Lieutenant General Walter Campbell.

. . .

Most stories about the alleged fly-under appear on the internet after 2019. Before that, there is no verifiable report of the incident. Given these results, all the features of an urban legend exist here. This is not to say the story is impossible.

There's more at the link.

I can see a fighter or fighter-bomber flying under that bridge, just as has been done to other famous bridges around the world (for example, see the Tower Bridge Incident in London, England in 1968).  However, the much larger, less nimble and maneuverable B-47 bomber would be very difficult indeed to fly through such a confined space.  If it was done, one can only tip one's hat to the pilot in admiration.

The question is, did it ever happen?  There seems to be no conclusive evidence out there.  I would think an incident like that would have attracted attention and headlines from all over, so I'm confused.  Was there an orchestrated cover-up by Strategic Air Command, so as not to encourage any of its other pilots from trying the same trick?

If any reader can shed any further light on the subject, please let us know in Comments.  I'm sure I'm not the only one intrigued by this rumor.

Peter

Some months ago, speaking about "Ground combat in an age of drone warfare", I said:

I predict we'll see new drones designed to do nothing but hunt down the other side's drones.  Think World War I.  Initially, aircraft were used only for reconnaissance, finding out what the enemy was up to.  In due course, the first bombs were dropped, to disrupt what the enemy was doing.  To stop both activities, fighter aircraft were designed to stop enemy aircraft from doing their thing.  I think we'll see "fighter drones" coming down the pike, to do precisely the same thing in modern terms.  I'll be very surprised indeed if they're not already being developed, along with weapons to equip them for that task.

Just one week later, I wrote about two Western interceptor drone systems that are being tested.

It seems that Russia has now developed its own interceptor drone technology, according to this video clip on Bitchute.  I'm sorry about the noisy advertisement embedded before the actual video:  I can't prevent that, but after only a few seconds you can select an option to skip the rest of the advert.  I recommend doing that.

I've no idea what drone system that is, but it certainly seems to be effective against relatively slow-moving quadcopter-type drone systems (those most often encountered over the Ukrainian battlefield).  If any reader knows more, please let us know in Comments.

We're seeing a much faster, rapid development environment in drone warfare than we have in most past "conventional" wars.  That's partly because the computer technology involved has become over-the-counter.  One no longer has to specially develop a chip or control system:  something already developed for other purposes can be re-programmed to do what one wants.  It's no longer necessary to spend months and millions of dollars designing a solution tailored for a single purpose.  Also, commercial components for light drones are freely available at very low prices.  Those developing them can buy what they want almost anywhere, and for not much money.  (For example, Ukraine has developed many different models, including this innovative - and very low-cost - "kamikaze" drone, costing between $5,000 and $10,000 apiece.  If one of those hits a battlefield vehicle like a tank or armored personnel carrier or artillery piece, any of which will cost many times as much, it's an economic victory every time as well as a tactical win.)

Sheer economics made interceptor drones inevitable.  If it takes a multi-hundred-thousand-dollar shoulder-fired missile to take out a ten-thousand-dollar drone coming towards one, it soon becomes impossible to afford such exchanges.  On the other hand, a ten-thousand-dollar drone intercepted by another ten-thousand-dollar drone is a much more affordable solution - and the much more expensive installations and vehicles protected by those interceptor drones will still be intact and able to operate.  It's a no-brainer.  I'm sure we'll see many more interceptor and fighter drones in the very near future.

Peter

Apparently the United Arab Emirates has been seeding clouds in its sky in an attempt to produce more rain.  It seems to have worked, not just very well, but perhaps too well.  A storm was brewing anyway, and the seeding appears to have "encouraged" it.  See for yourselves.

I can't believe they taxied that airliner right through floodwater like that!  It'll require major maintenance before it flies again.  The undercarriage will probably need fresh hydraulic fluid, and I think the engines are bound to have ingested rather more water than they prefer.  If I'd been a passenger on that thing, and looked out of the window to see all that spray, I think I'd have been hammering on the cockpit door, demanding to be let off the plane before they tried to take off!  I wonder if Boeing or Airbus offer a water-ski or flotation upgrade to their landing gear?

Oh, well.  I suspect the cloud seeding company can probably apply for some sort of bonus after being so successful - just as long as they don't apply to the airlines!

Peter

I was amused to read this news report.

European low-cost carrier Wizz Air has struck a long-term deal with UK biofuels firm Firefly Green Fuels to source sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) made from sewage sludge, part of measures it hopes will enable it to achieve its newly set SAF usage targets.

Wizz today set out its goal of powering 10% of its flights with SAF by 2030 and has backed a new pathway being developed by Firefly, which aims to use human waste as a feedstock for the fuel.

The carrier is investing £5 million ($6.3 million) in Firefy to support the development and certification of SAF produced from sewage sludge.

”At Firefly we have chosen to address the decarbonisation of the aviation industry through the perhaps surprising medium of sewage – or to be accurate, through the medium of biosolids,” explained Firefly chief strategy officer Paul Hilditch during a press conference in London today.

There's more at the link.

An airliner fueled by sewage sludge . . . really?

• In a restaurant, a sommelier knows his wines.  In the airline business, will the quality of fuel now be judged by a smellier?
• Fireflies' butts flash as they fly.  If an airliner is fueled by Firefly, will its . . . oh, never mind.
• How does Firefly plan to cater for growth in its business - issue laxatives and label them "fuel additives"?
• I can't help laughing at the thought of future complaints from those living around large airports.  Aviation in bad odor again?

You'll have to excuse my sometimes schoolboyish sense of humor.

Peter

Problems with Pratt & Whitney's geared turbofan engine, used by most recent-production Airbus A320-family airliners, have grounded almost a third of the fleet.

Around three in every 10 jets powered by Pratt & Whitney’s PW1000G family of turbofans are now sidelined worldwide.

That is according to analysis of Cirium data, which reflects, though not perfectly, the extent to which airlines from all corners of the globe are finding their operations disrupted by P&W’s recall of its geared turbofan (GTF) engines.

P&W has said the number of jets parked due to the need for inspections and replacement engine parts will peak right about now, in the first half of 2024. The issue involves defects in metallic components introduced during a manufacturing process due to the use of contaminated powdered metal.

. . .

Carriers have made no secret about the scale of the problem. Several have said that one-quarter or more of their GTF-engined aircraft have been sidelined, causing financial pressure and prompting then to curtail expansion plans, revamp operations and seek replacement jets in an incredibly tight market. Airlines are also negotiating multi-million-dollar compensation packages with P&W.

“The problem of our aircraft being unproductive is the fact [that] we are paying twice. We have aircraft investments unproductive on the ground, and we have to rent, wet-lease [aircraft from] another company to produce the capacity in the market,” Swiss chief executive Dieter Vranckx said during a 4 April event in Washington DC.

. . .

On 29 March, Spirit said P&W had agreed to compensate it to the tune of $150-200 million, warning the issue will force it to remove “nearly all” its A320neo-family jets from service at some point. That package equates to P&W paying Spirit about $18,000 daily per grounded aircraft, financial firm Jefferies said in a 1 April report.

There's more at the link.

I wonder how much this is costing Pratt & Whitney overall, in terms of the repairs (which take 250-300 days per engine, according to the article, and must cost millions in themselves) plus the compensation they're having to pay airlines?  Does their insurance cover this, or do they have to cover it out of their own resources?  If the latter, can they afford to both pay the compensation, and stay in business?  I imagine their Chief Financial Officer and his deputies are enduring sleepless nights trying to figure that out . . .

Peter

Courtesy of James Higham at Nourishing Obscurity, I came across this touching video.  It seems there's only one surviving airworthy Hawker Hurricane fighter from the Battle of Britain in 1940.  The mechanic who worked on that aircraft during the Battle is still alive, at 102 years of age, and was recently reunited with the plane.

A WWII RAF veteran had the chance to fly alongside the aircraft he helped maintain during the heroic Battle of Britain in 1940.

Jeff Brereton, who celebrated his 102nd birthday earlier this year, took to the air in BE505, the world’s only two seat Hurricane, with R4118, the only remaining airworthy Mk 1 Hurricane to have taken part in the Battle of Britain, and the aircraft Jeff worked on, flying alongside.

Jeff, who lives in Evesham, Worcestershire, said: “I have great memories of the plane. Of all the aircraft I dealt with, that was the one that stuck in my mind. It was unbelievable to be able to see that aircraft again, that it had survived.”

There's more at the link.

Here's a video report, including mid-air images.

I found the story particularly moving because my father was also an aircraft mechanic during the Battle of Britain.  I wrote about his World War II service some years ago.

It's nice to come across a good news story like this in our turbulent, not-so-good world.

Peter

One of my heroes was Jack Malloch, a World War II Spitfire pilot from Rhodesia who went on to dabble in all sorts of shadowy aviation corners for the next thirty years or more.  He had the reputation of being a "pirate of the air", very much in the mold of Sidney Cotton or Jan Zumbach.  I don't know if they ever met, but I'm sure the three would have recognized kindred spirits in each other, and probably in the buccaneers of the Spanish Main a few centuries earlier.

Jack was involved in sanctions-busting on behalf of Rhodesia and South Africa for many years, and also undertook clandestine flights in support of military and intelligence operations for both countries.  I first met him when he flew a group of people, including yours truly, in a clapped-out old Douglas DC-7 freighter to a place we never were to do something about which we know nothing, if you get my drift.  He was truly a character, and somewhat awe-inspiring in real life to a young wet-behind-the-ears type like myself.  I never knew him well, of course, only in passing:  but I count myself privileged to have met him.

Jack was killed in an air crash in 1982 while test-flying a Spitfire Mk. 22 that he'd restored (one of a squadron's worth that he and others had ferried to Rhodesia from Britain back in the 1950's).  A documentary movie was filmed describing the restoration and the aircraft's first flight, which I've embedded below.  Aviation enthusiasts will enjoy it.

Jack was pretty much unique in my (admittedly limited) experience.  I've never met anyone else quite like him.  I was therefore very pleased to find that a biography had been written about him, published a couple of years ago.  It's titled "Jack Malloch:  Legend of the African Skies".

It was difficult to decide on which excerpt to bring you today.  I settled on some of his military missions during the Rhodesian war, these using very old, worn-out aircraft that no self-respecting airline would have touched with a bargepole.  Nevertheless, he made a success of it, and his efforts helped keep Rhodesia alive for longer than anyone would have expected.

With the upsurge in fighting along all three of Rhodesia’s hostile frontiers, the war was putting a heavy strain on the military. In a move to boost its manpower, in January 1977 it was announced that conscription would be increased by three months and men over the age of thirty-eight needed to register for training and service.

As part of this militarisation Jack, at the age of fifty-seven was called up as a reservist to the Rhodesian Air Force. He was given the rank of Flight Lieutenant and was seconded to Number Three (Transport) Squadron. Although the authority and respect he was given far exceeded his lowly ‘official’ rank. Jack quickly realised that the Air Force, which were limited to a collection of old Second World War-vintage Dakotas, had a critical need for larger transport aircraft. As he now had the CL-44, Jack offered to loan one of his old DC-7s to the Air Force. This arrangement became more or less permanent from early April 1977.

On these military missions the DC-7 was given the Air Force registration number 7230. Interestingly it was also given a South African Defence Force registration number, TLT 907, for exclusively South African military missions. On these assignments Jack would usually fly with George Alexander who was the Commanding Officer of Number Three Squadron.

To begin with much of this flying was shuttling planeloads of Rhodesian soldiers down to Bloemfontein in South Africa to undertake parachute training as Rhodesia focused on building up its airborne assault capability. With these crack paratroops Rhodesia began to make ever larger and more ambitious raids into neighbouring countries to cripple the insurgents’ training, and supply facilities. But with this strategy economies of scale started to came into play and the Air Force needed to be able to deploy an ever higher volume of paratroopers. But in the face of modern anti-aircraft weapons, the slow DC-3s were just no longer sufficient.

Jack wondered if the DC-7 could be up for the job. The first challenge was that the DC-7 manufacturer categorically stated that the aircraft was impossible to fly with the side door open which would be a necessity for parachutists. But Jack wasn’t too concerned about operating regulations. He had the door removed and took the aircraft for a test flight. It was certainly more challenging to fly, but it wasn’t long before he got used to the handling.

Next, he needed some particularly brave soldiers to try jumping out of the DC-7 to see what would happen. There were some terrifying learnings to begin with as Charlie Buchan recalls, “With the DC-3 we jumped using a roof cable, but with the DC-7 the parachutes flipped round the edge of the wing and caught the tail piece, so we moved the cable from the roof to the floor. The first time we used the floor cable we got the full blast of the engines up our arses as we came out. We then ran the cable down to the corner of the doorway with a longer static line so that the parachute opened well beneath the tail.”

This was reiterated by one of the Parachute Jumping Instructors who later recalled, “The door was huge compared with the Dak. Drop speed for the Dak was ninety-five knots but the DC-7 would run in at about one hundred and fifteen knots. When we jumped we really felt the blast. Exit position had to be good or you would finish up turning in the slipstream which would cause twisting of the rigging lines during the parachute deployment. This meant wasted time kicking out the twists on the way down, and you had little enough time anyway from the operational drop height of just five hundred feet.”

Once these issues had been resolved a training exercise involving a planeload of sixty SAS commandos was organised. After ten run-ins dropping six men at a time the door dispatchers were well versed in how to work within the cargo-configured interior and confirmed they were ready for combat. Jack now just needed an actual operation to test the concept under real battlefield conditions.

Then, suddenly the war became very personal for Jack and the Malloch family.

In June 1977 Blythe’s eldest son Dave Kruger was killed along with three other young soldiers when their vehicle hit a landmine in the Binga area. He had been serving with 3 Independent Company of the Rhodesian Regiment. It was the second child that Blythe and Ted had lost so tragically. Then in early August urban terrorism hit Salisbury when a bomb exploded in Woolworth’s department store. There were almost one hundred casualties, mostly women and children. With the death of his nephew and the blast in the heart of Salisbury’s shopping centre, Jack realised that they were all now on the frontline. Although he was never one for revenge, after this Jack took a much darker view of the war and the need to not just defend themselves, but to start really fighting back.

. . .

With the success of his parachuting experiment, a couple of the military planners asked Jack for his opinion on an ambitious plan they were working on. The challenge was that once communist terrorists had infiltrated into the country they spread death and destruction and had to be hunted down individually. It was a classic ‘war of attrition’ tactic that was grinding down Rhodesia’s military resources. Just to sustain themselves Rhodesia needed to maintain a kill ratio of ten to one, but this was difficult. Rhodesia needed to cut the insurgents off at their source where they were concentrated and vulnerable.

The two largest Zanla training and ‘staging’ camps in Mozambique were Chimoio, ninety kilometres inside Mozambique and Tembue, which was another one hundred kilometres beyond it. These distances made an attack almost impossible and from the outset the decision-makers at Combined Operations rejected the idea as being far too risky. But Jack strongly believed in the SAS slogan ‘who dares wins’ and, along with the planning committee felt that with the right deployment of their air assets and a good dose of courage, a successful raid could be made. The distance and audacity of the plan also meant that neither Zanla nor Frelimo, Mozambique’s national army, would seriously expect an attack so far from Rhodesia’s border. As a result the enemy forces were concentrated in a very tempting target zone.

Eventually, after numerous persuasive presentations the operational plans for both Chimoio and Tembue were finally approved. Jack’s role in this was pivotal and according to one of the planners, “…without Jack’s personal interest and participation Operation Dingo could not have been undertaken. He was a key player.” This is high praise indeed considering the attack on Chimoio and Tembue would end up being one of the most successful cross-border raids of not just the Rhodesian War, but, of any war.

By late October 1977 intelligence reports estimated that the number of fighters at Chimoio had risen to eleven thousand with another four thousand at Tembue. This was five times the number of CTs (communist terrorists) already operating within Rhodesia. If this army of eager insurgents were all to make it across the border there was a real likelihood that the onslaught would overwhelm the country. Jack started work on the intricate logistics and started stockpiling extra munitions. The bombs, missiles and rockets for the air force were brought up from South Africa in the DC-8. These flights were off-loaded at the bottom of the runway by a small team of trusted senior ground staff and taken directly into New Sarum via the ‘bottom gate’ far away from prying eyes.

The attack had to be made quickly – and before the start of the summer rains as low cloud or stormy weather would compromise visibility and potentially ground the aircraft. Due to sanctions, Rhodesia didn’t have access to satellite imagery of the regional weather patterns. These images were beamed down to the Intelsat receiver in Europe and was then transmitted to a network of official receiver stations. Someone in Salisbury, using his own home-made equipment, was able to access this coded signal and download the images, dramatically enhancing the ability of the planners to predict the weather. How Rhodesia was able to pull off this early hacking back in 1977 is unknown, but desperation certainly led to innovation.

. . .

While Jack’s attention was being divided between the war and the commercial needs of the business, the Rhodesian Special Air Service were having remarkable success in the northern Tete Province of Mozambique. In light of this, Rhodesia’s military planners decided to redeploy them into the volatile southern Gaza Province, where, according to US Intelligence, Zanla were being trained by more than a thousand Cuban, Soviet and East German military advisors. This accounted for the area having been given the nickname, ‘The Russian Front’. The challenge was getting the special forces into the area. It was exactly the type of mission Jack had been waiting for. He suggested a free-fall HALO drop out of the doorless DC-7.

Once again there were reservations. It would be the biggest free-fall operation that the Rhodesians had attempted and just being able to find the right location for the drop was deemed to be almost impossible. That was Jack’s role. He had to find the Landing Zone and drop twenty-four men and their heavy equipment in exactly the right spot deep over enemy territory at the dead of night with no moon. Jack, who had an incredible intuition when it came to flying, knew he could do it. At three o’clock in the morning of October 11th, 1977 the twelve-thousand-foot jump was made. The men landed within a few kilometres of the LZ which was described as “an incredible achievement on the part of the pilot.” The undercover SAS teams remained in the Russian Front, effectively harassing the enemy until the end of the war. According to Kevin Milligan who was on most of these dangerous parachute deployments, “all the times I worked with Jack I found him to be a terrific character and a privilege to work with. The more challenging the mission, the more he seemed to enjoy it!”

. . .

With the success of his first SAS mission the commanders started taking Jack’s plans for Operation Dingo more seriously. To inflict the maximum number of casualties the Rhodesians wanted to strike the main training camp when all the recruits were lined up on the parade-ground. But the high-pitched whine of the approaching jets would compromise the element of surprise. They needed something to mask the sound. Jack suggested a slight change to the DC-8’s incoming flight path, timing it to overfly the camp just a few minutes before the strafing jets were scheduled to hit. Over time the residents in the camp “had become accustomed to the sound of the high-flying aircraft because this had been going on for weeks. All homeward bound Air Trans Africa flights had been specifically routed over the Chimoio base in a deliberate move to lull its inhabitants into accepting the sound as routine.”

The eventual attack was launched early on November 23rd, 1977. It involved almost every single Air Force aircraft, and almost every single member of the elite Special Air Service, along with almost one hundred hand-picked Rhodesian Light Infantry soldiers. Soon after midnight the helicopters began to assemble. The coordinated attack was due to start at seven minutes past eight, five minutes after Jack’s DC-8, to give time for the soldiers to reform in their tightly packed parade ground standing order. At about quarter past seven the massed armada of helicopters, weighted down with shock-troops and extra ammunition, took off. They crossed the border and headed down into the Mozambican plain via a steep-sided river valley.

According to one of the men, “All the helicopters descended to the low ground, initially over abandoned Portuguese farmlands, for the run to target. With helicopters all around and flying low over exquisite countryside, it was hard to fully comprehend that all hell was about to break loose. Halfway to target I saw the DC-7 cruise past on our port side looking quite splendid against the African background. Almost immediately it turned to commence orbits behind the formation of helicopters.”

Meanwhile, “The idea of using one noise to cover another worked perfectly. The Zanla men were taking up their places on the parade ground as the Hunters dropped down to release their golf bombs and the Canberras came in fast and low with their Alpha bombs. The helicopter gunships arrived on the scene just as this first wave of attack aircraft had gone through the target.” Seconds after the first wave of strikes the Hunters and old Vampire jets followed behind the Canberras attacking with their front-guns, rockets and frantan [napalm], devastating buildings as the circling helicopter gunships raked the kill zone.

According to Group Captain Peter Petter-Bowyer, “We did not see the air strikes going in southeast of us but landed to prepare to receive the DC-7 drops. The rotors had not yet stopped turning when I spotted the big aircraft already running in from the east. It was two minutes too early, yet the Admin Base protection troops were already peeling out of the huge cargo door before I had chance to call Squadron Leader George Alexander, who was flying second pilot for Captain Jack Malloch. The DC-7 lumbered past and rolled into a slow starboard turn to re-position for its second drop being the fuel drums and palettes of ammunition. On the ground and out of sight five hundred metres away, the troops were gathering up their parachutes.”

Meanwhile the first jets, refueled and rearmed, returned to start taking on the growing list of targets. At times there were as many as four targets lined up for near-simultaneous attention and the whole area was rocked by continual bomb blasts, cannon and anti-aircraft gunfire. The attack went on for a full eight hours.

By the end of it even the Rhodesians themselves could hardly comprehend the extent of their victory. By the Zanla High Command’s own admission, for the two Rhodesian soldiers killed in the attack the final kill ratio was one thousand to one, while the ratio of injured was about seven hundred to one. For the loss of just one Vampire jet, the devastating attack established the Rhodesian’s reputation of near invincibility on the battlefield. With this success, over the next two and a half years thirty more cross-border raids were made by the Rhodesians as they desperately tried to hold back the swelling tide of invasion.

But Jack’s role was not over. Twenty-four hours later, after quick repairs to their battle-damaged aircraft, the Rhodesians struck Tembue, codenamed ‘Zulu 2’ this time two hundred kilometres into enemy territory. During this phase of the attack soldiers were dropped from Jack’s DC-7 and retrieved by the Air Force helicopters. But they were right at the limit of the helicopters’ range and several couldn’t make it home so had to land wherever they could. One ran out of fuel while trying to cross the expanse of Lake Cahora Bassa and landed on a small remote island. Jack was back in the air an hour before first light the next morning. He dropped sixteen more RLI paratroopers to defend some of the scattered helicopters and dropped drums of fuel down to the helicopter that was stranded in the middle of the Mozambican lake.

Through this action Jack had firmly established his reputation as not just a fearless combat pilot, but also as a remarkable military tactician. He was now firmly entrenched into the military establishment, as Nick Meikle so eloquently describes, “ATA was at the forefront of Rhodesian sanctions-busting activities. Even though it was essentially a civilian airline, it displayed a military efficiency in the performance of a strategic role enacted with sublime tactical flexibility. It was rather like Rhodesia’s Strategic Air Transport Command.”

For these clandestine missions Jack’s ground-crews would repaint the DC-7 in dark olive green and black camouflage. “We painted the DC-7 with ordinary black-board paint, and it quite unexpectedly turned out to be excellent for anti-strela.” As they had to use large industrial brooms as brushes, the efforts were very rudimentary. Yet they always ensured that the first big black patch just behind the cockpit was in the distinctive shape of the local dark brown ‘dumpie’ beer-bottle.

. . .

At the end of July the Rhodesians launched another attack against Zanla’s Tembue base in northern Mozambique which had been rebuilt after the devastating attacks of Operation Dingo a year earlier. This attack involved both Jack and his nephew Mike Kruger. Mike was piloting his Alouette III helicopter, attacking targets and deploying ground troops, while Jack was captaining the DC-7, flying in fuel and supplies. The battle had included not just Zanla, but a large contingent of Frelimo soldiers who joined the fray firing a steady barrage of RPG-7 and Strela warheads at whatever aircraft they could see.

Those heat-seeking missiles were particularly dangerous for Jack’s big slow DC-7 which was certainly not designed for war. According to Group Captain Peter Petter-Bowyer who was the Admin Base Commander coordinating the attack, “What horrified everyone each time the DC-7 passed two hundred feet above us was the bright flaming of its ringed exhaust system that could not possibly be missed by a Strela in the fast-fading light.”

. . .

In late 1978 [Jack] had another challenging ‘live’ consignment – a huge pack of Irish foxhounds which the Selous Scouts wanted to try out for tracking terrorists. According to the Scout’s commanding officer, “I had a vet and he had connections in Ireland so Special Branch gave him a forged passport and off he went to find us some dogs. In the end he got seventy-six, all for free. The Irish donated them to us. Of course, it was Jack Malloch who flew them back for us in the back of his DC-8.”

. . .

In addition to developing an alternate source for weapons imports through the Comoros and securing a haul of critical fighter and bomber parts out of the Middle East, Jack had also become very involved in fighting the war itself. He personally participated in cross-border raids and had become a highly respected military strategist who, from late 1977, was involved in many of the High Command’s most audacious plans and proposals. In recognition of this in mid-September Jack was informed that he had earned the Independence Commemorative Decoration ‘for rendering valuable service to Rhodesia.’ Less than a month later he was recommended to become a Commander of the Order of the Legion of Merit. Although Jack appreciated these awards he was completely distracted by the next big cross-border raid that was being planned.

It was Operation Gatling and it was launched on the morning of October 19th, 1978 with simultaneous attacks against three large ZIPRA terrorist training camps in Zambia. This raid was a reprisal for the downing of the civilian Viscount six weeks earlier. Every single member of the Special Air Service took part, as did Jack’s nephew Mike Kruger, several members of Affretair’s flying crew, including Captain Chris Dixon who gained international fame as ‘Green Leader,’ and of course Jack himself who was at the controls of the DC-7 deploying special forces. As two of the three camps were within just twelve miles of the centre of the Zambian capital, the Rhodesians were worried that the Zambian Air Force, who now also had MiGs, would intercede. To make sure this didn’t happen ‘Green Leader’ in a fully loaded Canberra bomber circled the main control tower at Lusaka airport, thus commandeering Zambian air space for the duration of the battle.

By the time Jack got back from his four-hour trip to Lusaka and back, news of the attack was breaking. He quickly changed into his ‘civvies’ in preparation for the inevitable visitors. As Nori Mann explained, “To illustrate just how much of a hub we had become in the military circles, when the aircraft landed at New Sarum after the Green Leader raid, everyone, including the pilots, came straight to Jack’s office. They then played the audio recording of what had happened to everyone who gathered there. There was Norman Walsh who was the Director General of Combined Operations, Peter Walls who was Head of the Armed Forces and Air Vice-Marshal Hugh Slatter amongst others. That was the first time anyone had heard the details of the raid. There was a lot of swearing on the tape though and halfway through Jack apologised to me and said that I did not have to stay. He was such an old-school gentleman.”

The final tally for Operation Gatling was fifteen hundred ZIPRA combatants killed and thirteen hundred injured. This, for the loss of one SAS soldier killed and three airmen wounded when a helicopter was hit by cannon fire and downed. Although Rhodesia couldn’t afford to lose neither man nor machine, on balance it had been a good day.

. . .

[In 1979 South Africa] reinstated almost unlimited military support and the military planners in Salisbury readily took anything they could get, even integrating the South Africans into their next cross-border raid. This ended up being a joint attack against the Gaza Province of Mozambique. Designated as Operation Uric by the Zimbabwe-Rhodesians and as Operation Bootlace by the South Africans, the aim of the operation was to sever key transport bridges in the province and destroy a major staging point for the Zanla insurgents.

. . .

The Rhodesians launched Operation Uric on September 1st and the battle lasted almost a full week. It was one of the largest external operations of the war and it significantly changed the dimension of the conflict. With the Zimbabwe-Rhodesian and South African armies on one side and Zanla and the Mozambican army and police on the other, Uric internationalised the Rhodesian War. The deep incursion inflicted a high number of FRELIMO casualties and significant infrastructure damage which dramatically impacted the Mozambican economy. Although the Zimbabwe-Rhodesian negotiators at Lancaster House did not realise it at the time, Mozambique could not sustain this degree of punishment and Samora Machel insisted that Mugabe either negotiate a settlement or vacate Mozambique.

In total Jack flew three DC-7 missions in support of Uric, starting the day before launch when he flew twenty-five South African ‘Recce’ special forces (designated as ‘D Squadron SAS’ to disguise their origin) to their staging post at Buffalo Range near the eastern border. By the time the operation was wrapping up Jack was already into the detailed planning of his next daring mission. This time it was Operation Cheese and the plan was to down the longest road and rail bridge in Africa. It was located in northern Zambia and was being used to transport military supplies down from Tanzania. This ‘Tan-Zam’ rail link was also crucial to the Zambian economy as the only other option was the southern trade route through Rhodesia, and that would only be made available if Zambia stopped providing sanctuary to Nkomo’s insurgents. It was hoped this attack would force Kaunda and Nkomo to the negotiating table.

The logistics for this audacious attack were tricky though as the rail bridge was almost eight hundred kilometres north of Salisbury, well beyond helicopter range. This Chambeshi Bridge had been identified as a strategic target since 1976, but it was considered too far away and too complex to be achievable. But desperate times called for desperate measures.

While there was no way of getting the team of saboteurs out of the target area, a HALO drop from the DC-7 was the ideal way of getting them in. In early September while the battles of Uric were still raging Jack did a couple of night reconnaissance flights over the bridge to find a suitable drop zone. Once he confirmed the DZ the training for the jump began. The first team of four men were due to be dropped on the night of September 12th, just two days after the start of the Lancaster House talks. Kevin Milligan takes up the story, “As the owner of the DC-7, Jack could make sure he was on all the important missions with it. He thrived on it. He had been on the crew for the training jumps and we were in very good hands. Jack, a well-built man, oozing a quiet confidence, was a legend in his own right and had carried out many daring exploits in his time. Nothing phased him and the men found him considerate and amusing.” Unfortunately by the time they got over the target zone after midnight it was obliterated by heavy haze and they were forced to abort the mission. As they needed a clear full moon they had to wait almost a full month for the next suitable opportunity.

. . .

On September 27th Jack’s nephew Mike Kruger was called upon to evacuate an operational casualty. It was a hazardous operation requiring the casevac to be done right in the midst of an ongoing firefight. As Mike managed it successfully with no regard for his own safety he was awarded the Bronze Cross of Rhodesia. A week later with the full moon on October 3rd, 1979 Jack again flew the four-man SAS ‘freefall’ team back to the Chambeshi bridge.

According to Kevin, “I was very aware that the DC-7 must have sounded very noisy at eight thousand feet. We were already pushing our luck. I frantically peered out for any sign of the river and the crucial bend, but to my great disappointment, again, nothing. With a very heavy heart I told George to abort. I was so angry and frustrated, but had a final look out of the door. It was like something out of a movie. At just the right time and the right angle, I saw the moon glinting on the river bend that I was looking for, just as it was on the reconnaissance photo. There was little time for the normal flat turn corrections on run-in as I called to George “Come left, come left, harder – steady” then “Go! Go! Go!” and off they went. Straight into the storm. Full flap and undercarriage down to slow the aircraft.” It was one thirty in the morning on October 4th.

Paul French, who was leading the initial recce team remembers, because of his heavy kit, just flopping into the slipstream, the brief smell of the engines and then the silence of the free fall. As he turned to face the box of canoes and equipment he could clearly see the reflection of the moon and the dark shapes of the other men. He followed them down to ‘pull height’ and opened the parachute at two thousand feet as he wanted to be close to the box. Strangely the box was never found and the team, with their reduced kit had to improvise. When considering Jack Paul recalled that “Jack Malloch wasn’t young anymore. He was slightly overweight and seemed slow to move, but he exuded a calm confidence born of experience, risk-taking and success. He was a motivated man who appeared to be accustomed to getting his own way.”

. . .

Five nights later, a South African C-130 Hercules dropped the full twelve-man team of SAS commandos and all their equipment over the Chambeshi DZ. According to Kevin, “Someone in high places had obviously pulled strings and it was in South Africa’s interests too to have Kaunda reined in.” At two o’clock in the morning of October 12th the bridge was successfully severed and all sixteen commandos were able to hijack a couple of trucks and drive their way to a designated pick-up spot where the helicopters could reach them.

. . .

[At the end of the war] Along with the Commonwealth Monitoring Force the world’s news media also flooded into Rhodesia, each trying to find a unique newsworthy story from within the closed, war-torn little country. Remarkably the Daily Express chose to tell the story of “Captain Jack – Hero without a medal.” In their editorial they said, “Captain Jack Malloch was the doyen of the Rhodesian sanctions busters, the link man of the intricate spider’s web of commercial cross-deals which somehow kept Rhodesia alive for 14 years of economic isolation. Many believe that without Jack Malloch, Rhodesia would not have survived. Until now, Malloch, cloaked his usual life in silence. A small airline venture was the beginning of a career that was to turn him into perhaps the most notorious adventurer in the rugged world of African aviation.”

There you have it.  A remarkable record of achievement by a remarkable man.  Those who knew him, no matter how fleetingly, will not forget him.

Peter

Many people were surprised when the US Army cancelled its Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) program last month.  However, those who'd been following the battlefield performance of helicopters in the Russia-Ukraine conflict were less so.  Following the decision, there's been a lot of speculation about the way ahead for the US Army, and for other nations.  Flight Global observes:

“We are learning from the battlefield – especially in Ukraine,” army chief of staff General Randy George said as the FARA requirement was cancelled on 8 February. “Aerial reconnaissance has fundamentally changed. Sensors and weapons mounted on a variety of unmanned systems and in space are more ubiquitous, further reaching, and more inexpensive than ever before.”

Rather than continue to plough billions of dollars into the FARA project, the service instead has opted to “rebalance its aviation modernisation investments across new and enduring platforms”.

. . .

For FARA especially, the army envisioned a platform that would capable of operating low and fast. Such traits would enable the service to keep its aircraft and personnel out of harm’s when facing advanced ground-based air-defence systems and man-portable weapons.

Yet to be flown, the FARA candidates – Bell’s 360 Invictus and Sikorsky’s Raider X – were designed to meet a performance requirement of at least 180kt (333km/h) ... Instead, the service will continue to employ the Apache for such tasks, in concert with assets including a future tactical uncrewed aircraft system (FTUAS) and so-called air-launched effects (ALEs) ... The service has already performed trials involving the Black Hawk deploying Anduril Industries’ Altius-600 UAS. Such a system could be employed as an ALE, extending platform reach by providing surveillance, electronic warfare capability or kinetic effect.

The army will later this year also begin fielding Rafael’s Spike NLOS long-range air-to-surface missile with its V6-standard AH-64Es. The weapon has a precision strike capability against fixed and moving targets from a maximum range of 27nm (50km).

“There are a lot of countries interested in the integration of Spike NLOS for Apache ‘Echo’,” Rafael says, pointing to lessons learned from the war in Ukraine. “Everybody is looking for stand-off [range], since the threat is much greater than it used to be.”

Questions remain around the complex task of managing airspace congestion and deconflicting assets in an era where manned rotorcraft will operate in the same battlespace – and in many cases at the same altitude – as multiple UAS and ALEs.

There's more at the link.

In the light of the last paragraph above, I find the article's references to the Altius-600 and Spike NLOS weapons intriguing.  Both of the latter aren't exactly UAV's, and aren't exactly missiles;  they can both be "handed over" to guidance from different platforms, loiter over an area in reconnaissance mode (in the Spike's case, looking for targets), and generally make a longer-term nuisance of themselves in areas where the helicopter that launched them might not be able to survive enemy fire.  We're seeing "crossover" technology in action, where UAV's and missiles are less distinct from each other, more dual-purpose and flexible.

In that light, it's obvious why FARA was canned.  Even at higher speeds, a 180-knot helicopter simply can't cut it over a battlefield saturated with anti-aircraft missiles capable of ten times that speed or more.  It's too big and slow a target, comparatively speaking.  It would do no better than existing helicopters - so why not keep the latter, and save money by not developing the former?  It's far more difficult to detect much smaller ALE's and missiles, and much harder to shoot them down, so it makes sense to let them handle the well-defended battlefield airspace and treat the helicopter as a sensor integration and launching platform.

However, this gives rise to another question.  If helicopters have to adapt to that role, what about tanks?  I don't think we've seen the end of the tank, but its role on the battlefield may change, making it too a sensor integration and launching platform for other weapons - not a primary weapon in itself.  Nobody knows right now, but I'd hate to be a tank crew on a modern battlefield.  Video footage from Ukraine shows why.

It's almost impossible to evade detection by such a drone, particularly when there are dozens, even hundreds of them saturating a battle space.  A helicopter, or even multiple helicopters, could never achieve such saturation coverage - it would be far too expensive to buy that many helicopters, and every time one was shot down, the loss of its highly trained crew and an extremely costly machine would drain defense budgets.

I'm glad my soldiering days are done.  I suspect the battlefields of the future will be far more automated, and probably far more lethal.

Peter

It seems unmanned aerial vehicles, A.K.A. drones, are thronging the skies over parts of our southern border.

More than 1,000 drones per month are crossing into US airspace near the border with Mexico, a top general told lawmakers Thursday. 

The number of unmanned drone incursions is “alarming” and presents a “growing” potential threat to national security,  Air Force Gen. Gregory Guillot, the commander of North American Defense Command and US Northern Command, said during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. 

. . .

Mexican cartels have been using drones to track the location of authorities along the US-Mexico border in order to more easily smuggle humans and drugs, according to US Customs and Border Protection officials.

Rio Grande Valley Sector Chief Patrol Agent Gloria Chavez told the House Oversight Committee in February of 2023 that in her Texas sector alone, more than 10,000 drone incursions and 25,000 drone sightings had been reported in the last year.

“The adversaries have 17 times the number of drones, twice the amount of flight hours and unlimited funding to grow their operations,” Chavez told lawmakers.

There's more at the link.

It makes very good business sense for the Mexican cartels, which control almost all drug and people smuggling across the southern US border, to use drones for surveillance.  If they know where Border Patrol vehicles and roadblocks are at any given time, they can route their "shipments" around them;  and their drones warn them if a roadblock is moved, so that they can adjust their operations in real time.  It would be called sophisticated if a legitimate business used drones to avoid traffic slowdowns like that.  To do so for criminal purposes shows an unwelcome degree of sophistication.

It's not surprising, of course.  With a combined monthly cash flow measured in multiple billions of dollars, the cartels probably have more money available for their needs than most government departments.  To invest a hundred million dollars in drones, operator training and deployment is chump change to them - and the money they save by avoiding interception and confiscation of their drug shipments more than repays their expenditure.

As for cargo shipments by drone, I'm not sure that's economical on the scale at which the cartels operate.  Sure, commercial drones can be bought "off the shelf" to carry packages weighing several pounds, and a few larger models can handle hundreds of pounds:  but a human smuggler can carry up to a hundred pounds on his back, and thousands of pounds can be smuggled in a single truck.  It would make more sense to use the drones to make sure ground smugglers have a clear path to cross the border, rather than try to replace the latter with the former.  That may change, of course.

I've speculated in the past about the development of "anti-drone drones", interceptors whose sole task is to bring down "enemy" drones.  We're already seeing that in Ukraine.  Will the Border Patrol have to deploy such technology on our border with Mexico, too?

Peter

I was saddened to read about the cause of an aircraft crash in Switzerland last month.

In a preliminary report published on 12 March, the Swiss Transportation Safety Investigation Board (STSB) said the aircraft, belonging to Skydive Grenchen, was carrying 11 jumpers and one pilot on the afternoon of 18 February. While all jumpers, one of whom was slightly injured in the incident, exited the aircraft, the pilot died in the crash.

“When parachutists were being dropped off, the reserve parachute belonging to a parachutist who was still on the aircraft unintentionally opened,” the STSB says. “The parachutist subsequently collided with the elevator tailplane, causing it to be completely torn off the aircraft and the plane crashed.”

“The pilot was not wearing a rescue parachute,” it adds.

There's more at the link.

It sounds as if the inadvertently opened reserve parachute pulled one of the jumpers out of the plane, from where he collided with the tailplane.  Nobody could have foreseen this sort of incident, or its outcome.  I'm still trying to wrap my brain around how the impact of a human body could break off an elevator tailplane on one side of the aircraft.  One wouldn't think such an impact would be sufficient.  It would injure the person, of course, perhaps fatally, and damage the leading edge of the tailplane, but not knock it completely off the aircraft.  I'm sure the manufacturers will be investigating that as a matter of urgency.

The death of the pilot was a tragedy, of course.  The skydiving club had apparently bought the aircraft more than a decade ago, and he'd flown it for the club for years.  It just goes to show:  "in the midst of life we are in death", as the classic funeral service puts it.  We never know when or where or how we may come to our end.  That's a sobering thought . . . and it should be.

Peter

I was interested to see that a new unmanned aerial vehicle, or drone, has just flown using pulsejet technology - the same used to power the Nazi V1 flying bomb during World War II.

The pulsejet actually stops and starts many times per second in order to generate thrust, opening a series of valves to let in air and push the exploding fuel out the back of the engine, then shutting them again to detonate the next dollop of fuel.  You'll find a detailed explanation at Wikipedia.  The result is a loud buzzing sound, as the explosions follow each other in very rapid succession.  Here's a recording of a World War II V-1 in flight.

My mother endured months of bombardment by V-1's during 1944.  She said that as long as one heard the engine, one knew one was safe, because it was still flying;  but if it suddenly cut out, one knew it had begun its "death dive" to explode on the ground, and one hunted for cover as fast as possible.

The new pulsejet-powered drone is much smaller than its infamous predecessor, but it's only a prototype.  Future versions will doubtless be much larger and heavier.  However, it still sounds very like the V1.

If my mother was still alive, I wouldn't dare send her a link to that video.  She'd have all sorts of things to say to me (none of them polite) if she heard that sound again . . .

Interestingly, the V1's engine was not powerful enough (i.e. did not generate enough thrust) for the flying bomb to take off under its own power.  It had to be launched up a long ramp using a rocket booster, shown in the first part of the video clip below.

Once airborne, the pulsejet engine produced enough power to keep it flying.  The new drone's engine is much less powerful than the V1's, but the drone itself is much smaller, so it can take off under its own power.  I daresay that by the time they develop it into a production version, the engine will have been scaled up to cope with the additional bulk and weight.

Peter