PLA air operations in westpac region
- Thread starter Deino
- Start date
More flights to Japan! Thanks to Japanese we have new good photos of Chinese planes.
Interesting how they never specify which J-10 variant it is.
Is the J10A/B/C difference large enough that the radars can distinguish between them?
AFAIK Taiwan is just "deploying SAMs" now, they mostly stopped with sending fightersI in the air to intercept
B/C variants use more composites, have DSI inlet, and mount AESA/PESA on a canted radome. The radar difference should be very significant. Even the J-16, which is virtually identical to other flankers identically, has a very different radar signature.
escobar
Brigadier
Lot of air activities off the coast of Taiwan today from US & FR & AU. Thread
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escobar
Brigadier
There could be a large-scale PLA exercise next week. That may explain...
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The Type-056 don't have a helicopter hanger.
Given that they will mostly be used within the First Island Chain, they would be within return helicopter range from land. A Seahawk has a range of 830km. So if there are emergencies or something urgent, a helicopter can reach them. And if operating further out, they'll be accompanied by nearby ships which host helicopters.
A Seahawk costs like $50M, and my guess is that a Type-056 costs about $100M
plawolf
Lieutenant General
The full sized helipad represents a massive investment of the already limited available real estate on the 056. You don’t make that sort of investment for only ‘just in case’ contingency scenarios, and if you did, you would not put such a huge helipad on such a small ship. Just look at how small the helipads can be on other corvettes and private yachts to give an idea of how much bigger than bare minimum the 056’s helipad is.
The only justification for having such a huge helipad on such a small ship is if they intend to use it to accommodate a wide range of helicopters, and also to give themselves room to perform critical support functions like refuelling and re-arming.