PLA AEW&C, SIGINT, EW and MPA thread

[asif iqbal]

Not a bad excercise but it took 3 AWACS to do a 24 hour patrol, with mid air refuelling a single aircraft could do a 24 hour patrol by itself freeing up the rest of the aircraft

Out of the four units three will be operational at any one time so basically it took entire fleet of AWACS to do a round the clock patrol

Let's hope we see Y-20 with a refuelling probe soon

 

[plawolf]

Not a bad excercise but it took 3 AWACS to do a 24 hour patrol, with mid air refuelling a single aircraft could do a 24 hour patrol by itself freeing up the rest of the aircraft

Out of the four units three will be operational at any one time so basically it took entire fleet of AWACS to do a round the clock patrol

Let's hope we see Y-20 with a refuelling probe soon

Even with IFR, you would not want to use a single AWACS to do 24 hour surveillance. The airplane can take it, but the aircrew would be fatigued to a dangerous degree if they are on station for more than 24 hours straight. The minimum number of AWACS you can get away with using would be 2, they probably could have done that during this exercise, but would likely have had to use at least three sets of crews rotating shifts. Maybe that will be something they try next time.

 

[tphuang]

i think it's pretty standard to have 3 AWACS giving 24 hours coverage.

 

[Engineer]

Even with IFR, you would not want to use a single AWACS to do 24 hour surveillance. The airplane can take it, but the aircrew would be fatigued to a dangerous degree if they are on station for more than 24 hours straight. The minimum number of AWACS you can get away with using would be 2, they probably could have done that during this exercise, but would likely have had to use at least three sets of crews rotating shifts. Maybe that will be something they try next time.

This is a bit off-topic, but it would be a good idea to install some showering facilities and bunks on the AWACS if such an aircraft does intent to fly continuously for 24 hours.

 

[ladioussupp]

Even with IFR, you would not want to use a single AWACS to do 24 hour surveillance. The airplane can take it, but the aircrew would be fatigued to a dangerous degree if they are on station for more than 24 hours straight. The minimum number of AWACS you can get away with using would be 2, they probably could have done that during this exercise, but would likely have had to use at least three sets of crews rotating shifts. Maybe that will be something they try next time.

During Operation Desert Storm, E-3s flew 379 missions and logged 5,052 hours of on-station time.
5052/379 = 13.33 hours/sortie
379/42 = 9 sortie/day
It implies that Coalition air force maintained 4 to 5 E-3s on station covering more than 2000 km front line in the same time. Navy E-2C are not included.

Operation Desert Storm happened 22 years ago.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

 

[plawolf]

This is a bit off-topic, but it would be a good idea to install some showering facilities and bunks on the AWACS if such an aircraft does intent to fly continuously for 24 hours.

You can easily do without showers for a lot longer than 24 hours. With modern fully flat reclining airline seat-beds, you don't even need dedicared bunks.

The issue is less to do with the space or weight requirements of making an AWACS sleepover friendly, but more to do with how such extremely long shifts would degrade the mental alertness and performance of human operators. Having facilities to sleep is meaningless if doing so means there is no-one left on duty to actually process the radar data and direct other assets.

The biggest practical difficulty with making an AWACS able to stay on station for 24 hours or more is the fact that you would need at least twice the number of operators as there are workstations so they can rotate shifts to sleep and eat. That is just not a very efficient use of space on the AWACS, the plane's fuel reserves or highly skilled manpower.

 

[plawolf]

During Operation Desert Storm, E-3s flew 379 missions and logged 5,052 hours of on-station time.
5052/379 = 13.33 hours/sortie

Operation Desert Storm happened 22 years ago.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Which is consistent with a 8-12 hour shift plus transit time on and off station depending on how far away their home base was from the action.

As I said, 12 hour shifts is just about the most you can reasonably expect crews to do regularly without serious risks of human errors creeping in, and unless human physiology has changed in those 22 years, people still get tired and need rest, so the passage of time does not really mean much in this context. It is the human element that is the limiting factor, not technology.

You can maybe push the limits a little for short periods in extremes or emergencies, and it is not unheard of for military pilots to be issued with pills, drinks and other dietary supplements to help boost their alertness for short periods during intensive operations. But that is very much a short term emergency measure, and doing so regularly carries significant risks to both the well being of the pilots and their performance levels. Humans need sleep, you just cannot get round that for long.

 

[ladioussupp]

Which is consistent with a 8-12 hour shift plus transit time on and off station depending on how far away their home base was from the action.

As I said, 12 hour shifts is just about the most you can reasonably expect crews to do regularly without serious risks of human errors creeping in, and unless human physiology has changed in those 22 years, people still get tired and need rest, so the passage of time does not really mean much in this context. It is the human element that is the limiting factor, not technology.

You can maybe push the limits a little for short periods in extremes or emergencies, and it is not unheard of for military pilots to be issued with pills, drinks and other dietary supplements to help boost their alertness for short periods during intensive operations. But that is very much a short term emergency measure, and doing so regularly carries significant risks to both the well being of the pilots and their performance levels. Humans need sleep, you just cannot get round that for long.

According to USAF experience, it is impossible to have a 12-hour shift for a normal human. So spare crew is a must for successful mission. Since spare crew need space and supply to survive, the size of platform is the limiting factor, not only the human element.

 

[hardware]

According to USAF experience, it is impossible to have a 12-hour shift for a normal human. So spare crew is a must for successful mission. Since spare crew need space and supply to survive, the size of platform is the limiting factor, not only the human element.

likely the awacs was monitoring the situation in korea.

 

[asif iqbal]

I have no idea why I said one AWACS for a 24 hour patol, with the manpower and processing involved that wold simply not be possible, there are more than just pilots flying in a AWACS the size of a KJ-2000

I was reading about 24 hour missions of the USAF B2 bombers so I think they were at the back of my head when I posted confusing it with a AWACS!! Well it was kind of late!!

Anyhow yeah that's a good excercise to do, during high tensions aircraft flying hours sky rocket knowing what kind of challenges you will face are always useful, it's training for ground control, personal and the aircraft

That is really the kind of mission PLAAF should be doing and more of them as they build up thier AWACS fleet, situational awareness is a great asset in war, having it for 24 hours is even better