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F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

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Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#501

Post by mannerheim »

throwawaymaths wrote: post #496
mannerheim wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russian air defence has had a rather poor showing lately, so perhaps not.

I think that's a skill issue. Ukrainians are operating similar equipment with better success. Much like how India and China seem to have no problems operating the sister ships of the kuznetsov

Air defence was a weak point for Ukraine until Western countries provided some. As for the S-400, it's a post-Soviet design, and if the T-14 is vaporware and the Su-57 overhyped at best, perhaps one should not take claims on the S-400's capabilities at face value, especially given that there is visually confirmed evidence for two of them having been destroyed.

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#502

Post by [deleted] »

grogenaut wrote: post #356
MarkMarine wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got that and I was trying to answer in the least sarcastic way I could. I’ll try again. Autopilot isn’t an all knowing AI that is better at dealing with emergency than a pilot. In the region of flight that involves a pilot ejection, especially in a plane like the F-35, the “autopilot” that would be created that could successfully scout a target area that was safe to crash in, eject the pilot, then somehow move the…

to add 4 - if you had control with some badass AI why not land the plane safely for a recovery... the example in both the OP and the GP are planes lost in the country they are from not in enemy territory. The planes are not cheap... why would you purposefully wreck it in in a safe location.

[deleted]

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#503

Post by thrill »

ZeroCooly wrote: post #439
cameldrv wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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, es…

"I highly doubt the military allows their pilots to eject without absolute certainty that the multimillion/billion dollar aircraft is totally lost."

Military pilots most assuredly do not seek permission to eject. Given time they may indeed seek advice about the likelihood of a good landing.

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#504

Post by rmbyrro »

> "How in the hell do you lose an F-35? ... How is there not a tracking device...?" -- South Carolina Republican Representative Nancy Mace

Considering it is a stealth jet, broadcasting its location through easily detectable radio waves would be a serious bug, not a feature, wouldn't it?

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#505

Post by andrewstuart »

defrost wrote: post #11

The big question here is was it a Martin-Baker ejection seat? If so, there's a limited edition high end wristwatch in it for the pilot: https://us.bremont.com/pages/explore-bremont-partnerships-ma...

This is a fine timepiece.

A worthy chronometer to suit a crashed pilot.

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#506

Post by rootusrootus »

XorNot wrote: post #443
btbuildem wrote: post #70

An 80's movie dream is playing out for some rural kids, where they stumble upon a smouldering high-tech wreckage and as they explore it, men in suits pour out of black SUVs and talk to them in taciturn ways. Seriously though, these jets sound terribly overpriced for how unreliable they seem to be.

Criticism of the F-35 has been coming from a vocal selection of loons who's most common media appearances tended to be on Russia Today, and who's qualifications have been to lie about their qualifications, and misrepresent actual events which happened. Here's the thing: you don't know anything about the F-35. Because the project is secret. The capabilities are secret. And in a US political system that's incredibly fr…

I was an early armchair skeptic, and I've always had a not-so-secret love of the F-16. But after watching an F-35 demo at a recent airshow, I'm a convert. Anyone who says this plane can't out-dogfight an F-16 is delusional.

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#507

Post by justsomehnguy »

dragontamer wrote: post #494
justsomehnguy wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the A10 is even lower-altitude than that. So the window where you are vulnerable to MANPAD operator is less than of that AC-130. > Welcome to the CAS role. You .... Ah, yes, sorry, sir, looks like I need to take my Hazelnut Bianco Venti Latte and get out of your lawn, sir? > AC-130 has a ton of flares to misdirect enemy missiles automatically There is no ejection seats on AC-130. It would be never be operated w…

> If F-35 is at the MANPAD altitude then somebody (pilot) fucked greatly. F-35 in CAS role would never drop to MANPAD altitude and Shilka doesn't care about the plane stealthiness. *Multi-role* fighter. F35 has gun-pods and absolutely is expected to play some CAS role. Its not a dedicated CAS aircraft, no. Its not as good as other aircraft at the job (AC-130 has more loiter time, bigger guns, etc. etc.), but in a war…

> F35 has gun-pods and absolutely is expected to play some CAS role

> in a war you use what you can get your hands on

In a war you don't use a multi-billion toy for it's marketing qualities. Because this is the way lose your multi-billion toy.

> MANPADs are (probably) useless

Beam riders (eg Starstreak). And as soon as you are -lt 2km then you are in IR/UV/Image recognition danger zone too, because: low, fast, precise - choose two.

> albeit a crappy job at

*sigh*

No. It can't do CAS with it's guns. It can do precision drops for CAS (which were done by F-16 against fortified and non-moving targets quite effectively) but it never would be deployed in A-10 style, because that would be the one step before the embarrassment of losing a modern stealth fighter to some MANPAD.

> an airplane it can't even see

At 5-7km? Are you sure it can't be seen at all at that distance? It's a radar absorbing and a radar dispersing materials, not an invisibility cloak from Harry Potter. And yes, you can point it and spray-n-pray. With AAA rate of fire you can do this.

> Are the operators expected to aim and shoot purely on optics?

"but in a war you use what you can get your hands on"

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#508

Post by pfannkuchen »

MarkMarine wrote: post #370
LorenPechtel wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, no. A pilot might punch from a perfectly flyable aircraft that ran out of fuel and can't be glided in due to terrain. Or a plane that has no propulsion for other reasons. They might even punch from a plane with some fuel but damage that precludes landing--if they're over civilization they might point it into nowhere and punch so they come down over civilization.

Ok, and here we go with the armchair aviators. Time in a Microsoft flight simulator doesn’t give you expertise. I’ll just reiterate, by the time a pilot is ejecting from the aircraft, everything has been done. Read through the incident reports and find me an incident where this wasn’t done, cite it please. I can’t find one. https://www.airandspaceforces.com/docs/type/accident/

I mean, are there detailed accident reports for the sort of military plane with “keep it away from the enemy” type equipment onboard? Seems like you wouldn’t want to give away information about crash behavior since that could help the enemy recover the equipment.

Not saying it is plausible or not in the first place, I have no idea, but I don’t see how a lack of published reports of this happening in the real world proves anything.

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#509

Post by httpz »

Wait.. does this mean an enemy fighter jet with F-35 level of stealth capabilities can penetrate the US mainland without being detected?

I thought US had the air defense system that can defend against some level stealth aircrafts. Is that not the case?

Re: F-35 can’t be found after pilot ejected

#510

Post by actionfromafar »

HeyLaughingBoy wrote: post #410
bob1029 wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some Hollywood points in this direction. E.g. the Behind Enemy Lines ejection scene. Seems like a pretty good idea to self-destruct the most sensitive hardware (computers/chips/storage modules/etc) if recovery of the aircraft is no longer feasible.

> self-destruct Ooh, yeah. Let's add even more failure modes!

For drones it makes sense. Drones could boot up with all config in RAM so as to be completely devoid of mission parameters once power is cut.
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