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| Afghanistan |
| Airpower Summary for November 4: Airdrop, Airdrop, Airdrop! |
| 2007-11-06 |
| How do Coalition ground forces keep the enemy on the run in Afghanistan's mountainous terrain where roads are extremely limited (or simply don't exist) and still manage to get much needed supplies? Airdrop! Airdrop! Airdrop! I kinda like the snappy style from an official military spokesman. For six days, from Oct. 25 to Nov. 1, the U.S. Air Force achieved more than a 99% recovery rate for airdropped supplies in Afghanistan. This equates to more than 400,000 pounds of supplies being delivered to Coalition forces. The high success rate is a combination of factors: * The Joint Precision Airdrop System and the Improved Container Delivery System, or I-CDS (first used in combat over Iraq on Feb. 16, 2007, delivering six 1,200-pound bundles.) * Air Force Weather Agency weather models which crunch data from a four-dimensional wind model which is downloaded to a laptop to compute the aircraft's most accurate release point in the air * Aerial-port Airmen who know the appropriate parachutes to use with different types of airdropped supplies * Aircrew members who know the impact on the mission of the terrain, the drop zone size, weather and winds, and the threat levels for the area. |
| Posted by:gromky |
| #10 DEFENSETECH.org did an aticle on the long-serving C130 = C130E series,etc., i.e. the "B52 BUFF" of the Military Airlift Command. So good and reliable its older than many of the pilots and ground crew serving 'em. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2007-11-06 21:09 |
| #9 If you were a Goldie, I'd smack your nose for that bit of cleverness, Thomas dear. ;-) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-11-06 19:06 |
| #8 Nothing sez surpirse tactical advantage like an airdropped jeep, altho 300 (smallish) Duck Ex Mechanica would be ever-some-much moreso. |
| Posted by: Thomas Woof 2007-11-06 18:13 |
| #7 Well, you could always try to cleverly disguize it with a 18 or a 88... |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2007-11-06 17:24 |
| #6 Yeah, it's discouraging. I don't know, I like it. |
| Posted by: Heil Hitler1802 2007-11-06 17:17 |
| #5 Yeah, it's discouraging. |
| Posted by: Snoter Hitler6238 2007-11-06 16:24 |
| #4 Hitler?! What the HE## kind of assigned name is that?! YIKES! |
| Posted by: Clith Hitler3622 2007-11-06 16:06 |
| #3 Hope the less than 1% attrition percentage is of the "pull string...go boom" variety! |
| Posted by: Clith Hitler3622 2007-11-06 16:05 |
| #2 "The idea would be to deliver small vehicles, like a jeep, to where they could give a winning tactical advantage." That's already done with LAPES. |
| Posted by: crosspatch 2007-11-06 13:51 |
| #1 I see the next stage as a parachute assisted heavy load carrying drone aircraft, dropped from a much larger aircraft. Some odd combination of a guided parachute, wings, perhaps an internal prop engine, maybe even something like landing retros to give an extra soft landing. The idea would be to deliver small vehicles, like a jeep, to where they could give a winning tactical advantage. Say a unit receiving fire from a mountain. Such a vehicle would permit part of the unit to maneuver to the other side of the mountain to stop the escape of the attackers. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-11-06 13:36 |