Am I the only one shocked that it's stealth was effective enough that they couldn't track it even with a malfunctioning transponder?
Not in the slightest bit.
F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
431–440 of 693 posts
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#432Earlier quoted context omitted.
But you have to fly low to avoid the area SAM defense. Stuff like the Patriot doesn't stop enemy aircraft, it forces them down low where MANPADs and even guns are useful.
Wild Weasel literally is baiting SAM to shoot at them. That's the point of Wild Weasel, you bait the RADAR then kill the air defense before they lock in on you. Any RADAR works by emitting radio waves, and those radio waves can be tracked with a homing missile. Just looking at the wild weasel causes the RADAR system to possibly be bombed. SAM installations vs Wild Weasel tactics are very complex. In any case...if you…
Using drones to bait them like in Baghdad in 1991 would work too.
How would something like that help Ukraine? Does Russia even need HARM when they have so much artillery they can just turn the surroundings of the radar site into the surface of the moon? My understanding is Ukraine preserved its air defenses by moving them right before 2/24 and is betting on Russian cruise missile avionics and military intelligence sucking.
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#433Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Because its large profile and low operating altitudes around 7,000 feet (2,100 m) make it an easy target, its close air support missions are usually flown at night.[7] AC-130 is only effective against a flipflop army... which doesn't have a friend which would supply tons of MANPADs to the gallant people of your country.
And the A10 is even lower-altitude than that. Welcome to the CAS role. You fly low and shoot cheap bullets (lots and lots of cheap bullets), but you're also vulnerable to ground fire. At least the AC-130 has a ton of flares to misdirect enemy missiles automatically. A10 basically has no form of defense. In any case, a CAS aircraft is in a position of higher risk than most other aircraft since it needs to travel low e…
From what I understand both sides have plenty of Buks but Russian ELINT and ECM has been remarkably inflexible outside of counter battery roles (besides some broad spectrum jamming earlier in the conflict)
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#434Earlier quoted context omitted.
The plane-sized drones are capable of some autonomous operation. It may or may not be possible to spoof that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incid... The smaller drones are not usually autonomous. See the Starlink alleged incident. Inertial guidance is popular but very expensive to do accurately with laser gyros. I'm surprised there haven't been more "terrain following" systems. There's probab…
> See the Starlink alleged incident. Ukraine says it happened and Musk does too - is ‘alleged’ needed?
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Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#435Hand over as much intel to 4chan as possible and watch them find this thing in a matter of hours...
Came here to say that. Thinking topographic maps of the region for higher probability impacts, wind direction maps, air quality data, last known trajectory, shodan cameras, cell tower signal interference blips, RF noise from surviving electronics or beacons. Not a lot to go on though.
And don't forget current fuel load to estimate radius of search area.
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#436Relevant crashes into swamps:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ValuJet_Flight_592
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1958_Tybee_Island_mid-air_co...
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#437Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's the most advanced plane the military has. You would think that an eject would trigger some additional communications or allow remote control of the jet.
"Remote control of jet" comes with fairly obvious adversarial risks the military likely wishes to avoid.
Drones?
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#438Earlier quoted context omitted.
> See the Starlink alleged incident. Ukraine says it happened and Musk does too - is ‘alleged’ needed?
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But one says ‘I did it’ and the other says ‘he did it’.
What other agenda could be going on here? They are both hiding some Russian capabilities from us?
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#439Earlier quoted context omitted.
I live in the real world, and there are incident reports that go into great detail about every aircraft loss. I’ve read every one since 1999, and I’ve never seen an incident where the pilot ejected over a populated area in an aircraft that was still controlled. What you all are imagining does not happen, and the odds of it happening are vanishingly small.
Have you looked at the MiG-23 that crashed last month in Michigan?
I think it's worth noting that that the MiG-23 that crashed in Michigan was a privately owned aircraft, flown not by an active service member. I highly doubt the military allows their pilots to eject without absolute certainty that the multimillion/billion dollar aircraft is totally lost.
Additionally, I highly doubt there are many privately owned military jets equipped with ejection seats that are allowed to fly, especially in residential airspace.
Also, as someone who works on FMS's the likelihood that a military program would spend the money required to code an AT/AP to have that capability is just too close to zero.
Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected
#440Earlier quoted context omitted.
My kids go to a school where the majority of the kids are somewhere around poverty level (easy to be under there in Silicon Valley if you are not an engineer in tech). I absolutely believe the administrators when they say that the meals some of the kids get in school might be the only ones they get for the day (by far not the majority: those are hard working parents, dedicated to their kids). And watching how much ha…
I support free school lunch programs; no child should go hungry. But in California at least, many of the families with children who struggle with food insecurity entered the country illegally or with dubious claims of refugee status. That is a broader societal issue that can't be addressed through school funding or wealth redistribution.
Sure but they still need to eat.