Aircraft Carriers III

US Navy remotely lands F/A-18 Super Hornet on carrier deck

• 
  

• 30 MARCH, 2018
  
• SOURCE: FLIGHTGLOBAL.COM
  
• BY: GARRETT REIM
  
• LOS ANGELES

Naval officers aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln demonstrated for the first time the ability to remotely take control of an aircraft and land it on an aircraft carrier’s deck.

Using the ATARI system, or aircraft terminal approach remote inceptor, landing signal officers demonstrated remote piloting of the F/A-18E Super Hornet while conducting carrier qualifications and flight testing aboard the Abraham Lincoln in March. The officers also demonstrated touch-and-go manoeuvres with the system.

The ATARI technology was developed at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland by Naval Air Systems Command. It was initially tested on a Learjet in 2016, performing shore-based low approaches. An undisclosed number of F/A-18s were fitted with the technology in 2017. The system was deemed ready for trials at sea by the "Salty Dogs" of Air test and Evaluation Squadron 23.

"There was some nervousness because the sea state was so bad," said Lt John Marino, a carrier suitability pilot from the "Salty Dogs" and the first pilot to land on a flight deck using ATARI. "Back on the airfield, testing was benign."

Image courtesy of US Navy

The system demonstrated a potential method for recovering an unmanned aerial vehicle by using the landing signal officer’s ability to observe and fix glideslope and lineup errors, said the US Navy. It is not intended to be a primary method for recovering manned aircraft, but provides a relatively inexpensive backup system.

During testing, the ATARI system operators controlled an F/A-18 aircraft using a joystick, while a safety pilot sat in the cockpit as backup. The technology is capable of taking over an aircraft from up to five miles away.

Testing was conducted over the course of two days in conjunction with carrier qualifications. ATARI is not scheduled for fleet-wide implementation as the system’s engineers plan to analyze the data collected aboard Abraham Lincoln and make adjustments for further at-sea testing.

Click to expand...

While the Navy’s two Joint Strike Fighter training squadrons tested their sea legs in the Atlantic in March, the future of the Navy’s operations was getting underway in earnest at Naval Air Station,

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

, California.

The Argonauts of Strike Fighter Squadron 147 technically began the transition to the F-35 in December after landing back at Lemoore following a six-month deployment aboard the carrier Nimitz as part of Carrier Air Wing 11.

“That was the final time they flew in the Super Hornet and their maintainers and pilots have now been training, both down at Eglin Air Force Base, as well as in Lemoore with the [Replacement Squadron], VFA-125,” said Cmdr. Ron Flanders, spokesman for Naval Air Forces in San Diego.

“Pilots have been going to training in the full-mission simulators in Lemoore and we anticipate them being certified as safe for flight later this year,” he said. Despite the wait, “they are officially considered an operational squadron, the Navy’s first and only operational F-35C squadron.”

Navy officials are targeting October as a ready date for VFA-147, which will be receiving aircraft from the Roughriders of VFA-125, as well from the factory.

But what is clear is that the Navy has an ambitious plan for the Joint Strike Fighter, with a goal of fielding 20 operational JSF squadrons by the early 2030s.

Executing that plan will most likely be the responsibility of a new joint strike fighter wing — based in Lemoore — that will debut in the near future. That command’s mission will be to focus on building the Navy’s JSF capabilities and managing the transition of the squadrons that will be switching to the Navy’s newest fighter jet.

The next step for the Argonauts will be to start more intensive flying as they begin their integration into a carrier air wing, a process that will include preparation for deployment on the aircraft carrier Carl Vinson in 2021.

What remains unclear, though, is who will come after VFA-127 in the transition to the F-35C. The Navy has not yet clarified how that continued transition will unfold.

Click to expand...

From the Report:
CVN-78, CVN-79, CVN-80, and CVN-81 are the first four ships in the Navy’s new Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) class of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers (CVNs).

CVN-78 (named for Gerald R. Ford) was procured in FY2008. The Navy’s proposed FY2019 budget estimates the ship’s procurement cost at $12,964.0 million (i.e., about $13.0 billion) in then-year dollars. The ship received advance procurement (AP) funding in FY2001-FY2007 and was fully funded in FY2008-FY2011 using congressionally authorized four-year incremental funding. To help cover cost growth on the ship, the ship received an additional $1,394.9 million in FY2014-FY2016 and FY2018 cost-to-complete procurement funding. The ship was delivered to the Navy on May 31, 2017, and was commissioned into service on July 22, 2017.

CVN-79 (named for John F. Kennedy) was procured in FY2013. The Navy’s proposed FY2019 budget estimates the ship’s procurement cost at $11,341.4 million (i.e., about $11.3 billion) in then-year dollars. The ship received AP funding in FY2007-FY2012, and was fully funded in FY2013-FY2018 using congressionally authorized six-year incremental funding. The ship is scheduled for delivery to the Navy in September 2024.

CVN-80 (named Enterprise) was procured in FY2018. The Navy’s proposed FY2019 budget estimates the ship’s procurement cost at $12,901.7 million (i.e., about $12.9 billion) in then-year dollars. The ship received AP funding in FY2016 and FY2017, and the Navy plans to fully fund the ship in FY2018-FY2023 using congressionally authorized six-year incremental funding. The Navy’s proposed FY2019 budget requests $1,598.2 million in procurement funding for the ship. The ship is scheduled for delivery to the Navy in September 2027.

CVN-81 (not yet named) is scheduled to be procured in FY2023. The Navy’s proposed FY2019 budget estimates the ship’s procurement cost at $15,088.0 million (i.e., about $15.1 billion) in then-year dollars. The Navy plans to request AP funding for the ship in FY2021 and FY2022, and then fully fund the ship in FY2023-FY2028 using congressionally authorized six-year incremental funding. The Navy’s FY2019 budget submission programs the initial increment of AP funding for the ship in FY2021. The ship is scheduled for delivery to the Navy in September 2032.

Oversight issues for Congress for the CVN-78 program for FY2019 include the following:

• whether to approve, reject, or modify the Navy’s FY2019 procurement funding requests for the CVN-78 program;
• whether to accelerate the procurement of CVN-81 from FY2023 to an earlier year, or use a block buy contract to procure multiple aircraft carriers, or pursue a combined material buy for multiple aircraft carriers, or do some combination of these things;
• cost growth in the CVN-78 program, Navy efforts to stem that growth, and Navy efforts to manage costs so as to stay within the program’s cost caps;
• CVN-78 program issues that were raised in a January 2018 report from the Department of Defense’s (DOD’s) Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E); and
• whether the Navy should shift at some point from procuring large-deck, nuclear-powered carriers like the CVN-78 class to procuring smaller aircraft carriers.

Click to expand...

The U.S.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

plans to deploy its

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

variant to

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

, Japan, in roughly the next three years amid reports the C-variant will achieve combat-ready status later than expected.

While the timeline is not set in stone, Carrier Air Wing 5 in the Pacific is expected to receive the

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

sometime after 2021, Cmdr. Reann Mommsen told Military.com.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

The Navy "places its most advanced and combat-capable units in the forward-deployed naval force," she said in an email. "CVW-5 has the Navy's most lethal aircraft, including the most combat-capable

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

strike fighters."

Mommsen said the first F-35C squadron will replace an F/A-18 Super Hornet squadron, which will return to the U.S.

When the transition is complete, CVW-5 will have a mix of fourth-generation Super Hornets and fifth-generation F-35Cs designed to take off and land on aircraft carriers.

"Like all fixed-wing squadrons in CVW-5, the F-35Cs will forward deploy to MCAS Iwakuni. This future upgrade will enhance the capabilities of the air wing and its mission to defend Japan and contribute to regional peace and security," Mommsen said.

The F-35C is not expected to reach initial operating capability until 2019, according to a report from Aviation Week.

Rear Adm. Dale E. Horan, commander of Carrier Strike Group 8,

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

that the Navy needs to see a successful demonstration of the F-35's software during its Initial Operational Test and Evaluation trials before it can declare the C-variant combat ready.

The Lockheed Martin Corp.-made F-35 was expected to be ready for IOC sometime between August 2018 and February 2019,

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

submitted to lawmakers.

Meanwhile, the Navy is also gearing up to replace its aging

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

fleet aboard CVW-5 with new Navy CMV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft, Mommsen said.

A "CMV-22B detachment is expected to replace the detachment of C-2A Greyhounds currently assigned to Carrier Air Wing 5 and

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

," she said, adding that no decision has been made as to which base in Japan will receive the Ospreys.

The

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

's version of the Osprey, the

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

,

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

of schedule.

A squadron of 10 Ospreys was due to arrive at

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

in 2020, but five aircraft will first be based at U.S. Forces Japan under the accelerated move.

Click to expand...

Jura said:

cross-posting from
US Navy MQ-25 Stingray Unmanned Aerial Tanker
:
Is Boeing working on a second MQ-25 drone prototype?

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

has chosen

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

to make the engine for its MQ-25 offering in the three-way competition to become the U.S. Navy’s Stingray, an unmanned, carrier-based tanker aircraft.

Boeing’s MQ-25 Program Director Don “B.D.” Gaddis says its “T-1” flying prototype is as an advantage in its quest to prevail in the hunt for the fixed-price contract to develop and produce four aircraft. Boeing’s two competitors,

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

and

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

, are operating with design concepts.

Boeing will use the

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

engine, flown by the Air Force’s high-altitude

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

and Navy’s Triton UAVs. “The engine itself has over 73 million hr. on it, so it’s a testament to the design maturity of the airplane and the engine,” Gaddis said.

The creation of a prototype gives Boeing a head start relative to its rivals, Gaddis said. To build it, the company drew on a design from October 2012, when the Navy was pursuing an

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

“What makes it unique is that it’s built,” Gaddis said. “We have already demonstrated a lot of the functionality with the deck handling and the software, the mission computer, the vehicle management system, the Rolls-Royce engine. We have already demonstrated a lot of this stuff. We have done almost everything short of flying the aircraft.”

Boeing has run the engine at low power and high power in different conditions. “The big one is the deck handling leading up to first flight after the [contract] award this summer,” the former Navy rear admiral said.

Other than the Cobham aerial refueling system pod, Boeing is not yet revealing other suppliers on the program.

Gaddis said Boeing’s ability to accept that risk on the program early on should help it now, given the Navy’s desire to award a contract in late summer. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson has placed the highest priority on schedule, Gaddis said. “Price is No. 2. He wants this airplane out there quickly. The [request for the proposals] and source-selection criteria reflect those priorities well.”

Click to expand...

Jura said:

noticed
French aircrews ready to train in Norfolk

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

A group of Rafale strike fighters of the French Navy have begun to arrive at a naval air station (NAS) in Virginia to stage for upcoming carrier qualifications on board a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier.

Six Rafales arrived at NAS Oceana in Virginia Beach on April 5, according to an email sent by aircraft spotters in the area. Six more Rafales were expected to arrive April 6, along with one E-2C Hawkeye radar warning aircraft.

The Rafales are assigned to 11, 12 and 17 Flotilles (squadrons), and the E-2C is assigned to 4 Flotille.

The French Navy pilots are in the United States to perform carrier takeoffs and landings to renew and maintain currency while their aircraft carrier, FS Charles DeGaulle, is in an 18-month refit. The French Navy is the only navy other than the U.S. Navy that still operates aircraft carriers equipped with catapults and arresting gear for tailhook aircraft.

After field carrier landing practice, the French aircraft will embark on USS George H.W. Bush for two weeks for joint carrier operations with the U.S. Navy’s Carrier Air Wing Eight.

Click to expand...

Jura said:

I quit reading

Five priorities for the Modernising Defence Programme 2018

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

at this moment:

"... The RN needs to be at the forefront of developing and adopting these specific technologies;

• Hypersonic missiles"

!! they can't afford AShMs Nov 11, 2016

etc. and the blogger goes hypersonic, common!

Click to expand...

Jura said:

until now I thought a tanker aircraft couldn't be a surveillance aircraft but
Navy, Industry Looking for Design ‘Sweet Spot’ for MQ-25A Stingray
source:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Click to expand...

After years of requirements churn and program uncertainty, the signal to companies vying to build the Navy’s first operational unmanned carrier aircraft is crystal clear: the Navy wants the MQ-25A Stingray as soon as possible.

On Jan. 3, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and General Atomics all submitted their responses to the Navy’s final request for proposal for the airframe of the Stingray and are expecting the service to select a final design as soon as this summer.

The procurement schedule was accelerated at the behest of Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson, Boeing MQ-25A program manager and former program executive officer for Navy tactical aircraft B.D. Gaddis told reporters on Thursday.

“His number-one priority is the schedule. Price is number two. He wants this airplane out there quickly. The request for proposals and the source selection criteria reflect those priorities really, really well in terms of accelerating the schedule,” Gaddis said.
“He’s putting the pedal to the floor. Normally it takes NAVAIR about 18 months to do a source selection like this. They’re going to do it six months. When the CNO said he wanted to accelerate the schedule, he meant it.”

Outside of the requirements to industry, the service signaled it was bent on moving quickly on the program by including $719 million for the program development and the first four production airframes as part of its Fiscal Year 2019 budget submission.

The program has been moving quickly since the Office of the Secreatary of the Defense watered down the requirements of the Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) concept and pushed companies to focus on the tanking requirement.

The decision to focus on tanking was the result of a strategic review of the UCLASS program led by then-Deputy Defense Secretary Bob Work as Congress and the Navy struggled with how to define the role of UCLASS in the fleet.

“Going back to the UCLASS days, there’s a lot of… not everyone was aligned — to say it nicely — between Congress, OSD and the Navy and the fleet on the requirements,” Gaddis said.

A major driver of the program shift was to provide much-needed relief to the fleet’s already overworked F/A-18E/F Super Hornets that are burning up to 20 to 30 percent of their flight hours as tankers for deployed air wings.

The Navy has been vague about the requirements, but USNI News understands the service’s basic requirements will have the Stingray deliver about 15,000 pounds of fuel up to 500 nautical miles from the carrier.

As part of an earlier risk-reduction contract that also included Northrop Grumman, all the competitors were required to conduct a tanking trade study to best configure their offering for the MQ-25A work.

Based on those findings, Boeing and Lockheed Martin both determined modified versions of their UCLASS pitches would fit the bill for the service.

From 2012 to 2014, Boeing’s Phantom Works quietly built a flying prototype of its UCLASS design, built around a Rolls-Royce AE 3007 engine.

As the competition moves forward, Boeing is the only current competitor to have revealed a working prototype for its Stingray bid, since Northrop Grumman dropped its X-47B design out of the competition late last year.

“We had to go through that entire study, just like we did with UCLASS, to make sure that we had the right engine, we had the right design to see if we had to change anything substantial, and the answer that came out of that study was that we no we didn’t,” Gaddis said.
“Now that it’s just a tanker with little [information, surveillance and reconnaissance], we’re still in the wheelhouse with this requirement.”

Likewise, Lockheed Martin based its bid on its original UCLASS design. Lockheed had pushed a flying-wing design for its UCLASS offering that could grow into a stealthier platform more easily, Lockheed Martin’s MQ-25A program manager John Vinson told USNI News last week.

“We spent a lot of time at looking at what I would call conventional winged aircraft, but we also continued to look at our old UCLASS design, which has been designed as a stealthy first-day unfettered-access kind of ISR asset,” Vinson said.
“What can we do with the flying wing if we relax that stealthy, unfettered access requirement?”

In September, representatives from General Atomics said their bid was going to borrow heavily from the company’s experience in developing its MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper remotely piloted aircraft for the Air Force, in addition to the company’s Sea Avenger concept design.

Ahead of the final selection, the competitors will have to prove a deck handling demonstration for their airframes as part of the ongoing risk-reduction contracts.

While the companies are vying for the airframe, the Navy is responsible for designing and developing the data links and the ground control station and acting as the lead systems integrator for the effort. Much of that work was part of the Navy’s X-47B carrier launch and recovery tests in 2013 and 2014.

Moving ahead, the real challenge isn’t launching a UAV on and off the carrier but how the aircraft will fit into the airwing and the strike group.

“What’s the breakthrough that’s going to occur with the MQ-25? It’s not frankly the ability to operate an unmanned air system off a carrier. We know how to do that,” outgoing Skunk Works head Rob Weiss told reporters on Monday.
“The learning opportunity is going to be manned, unmanned teaming.”

Click to expand...