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Aviation History
1988
1988 - 2562.PDF
^^^^s MK Above An MC-130 Combat Talon takes on fuel from a KC-135 Stratotanker. Right A Fulton recovery The present Sikorsky MH-53Hs are being converted by the Navy Air Facility at nearby Pensacola to MH-53J Pave Low III standard. Lt Col Gary Weikel, CO of the 20th SOS, elaborates: "Basically the stuff we liked we are keeping and the stuff that was no good we are replacing, and we're putting extra ECM on board, improving the infrared counter- measures [IRCM], and terrain following radar [TFR], and fitting a missile warning receiver and a larger memory in the central avionics computer. We're also restoring the tail fold for easier concealment in the field." The mission of the 20th SOS is long-range infiltration and exfiltration (the American terms for drop and pick up) of Special Forces teams; even the MH-53H has a sophisticated array of equipment to assist in the mission. "Even with the H model I could, theoretically, fly from here to, for instance, Beirut and put it into a hover over an individ ual preselected house at night in bad weather. Of course, the trick of special ops is knowing which house you want to go to. "In 'Nam the average length of an HH-53 mission was 9hr using inflight refuelling [I-FR]. You can extend the range in two ways: land and refuel at a forward area refuelling point [Farp], which was what Desert One was, or use I-FR. We use either or both methods as the mission dictates, and we I-FR at 100ft at night using night-vision goggles [NVG], which is kind of sporty. We have a wobble pump permanently fitted in the oil system to top up the oil in flight from drums in the back, so, theoretically at least, our range is limited only by pilot fatigue—and we could carry a spare crew, so that gives us a lot of flexibility. "I have 218 flyers on the squadron, includ ing 80 pilots. The MH-53 crew is six: two pilots, two engineers, a navigator, and an ECM operator. All the crews are I-FR and night-ship landing and Farp-qualified; a few are not yet NVG-qualified because we didn't have enough aircraft to push everyone through at once, but it is just a few. About half the pilots are ex-Army, and all have two combat tours and 5,000hr of helicopter time. They are probably the most combat- experienced people in the US Air Force." Weikel points out some of the interesting features and their uses on the MH-53. Flir and TFR screens dominate the panel in front of each pilot, and there is a large colour moving-map display on the centre console. Gary Weikel talks me through it. "In 'Nam we used to operate under flares, but we had to stop that when the Sams and AAA got too hot. So we needed a covert night capability and we got the AAQ-10 Flir, which is slaved through the avionics computer, which generates video symbology overlay on the head-down display. We can select it to black- hot or white-hot, and either a lx or 3x field of view. The symbology gives dive/climb/ steer commands and flightpath vectors generated by the terrain-avoidance radar and inertial nav system. "The radar and the Flir can be used to update the INS, which shows present posi tion on the 35mm moving-map display. The map scale is selectable—either 1:250,000 or 1:1,000,000—and can be north or heading- aligned. Likewise, we can see something on A US Navy Seals diving team and their boat deploy from an MH-53 The cockpit of the MH-53E; note the fly-by-wire secondary cyclic stick FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL, 10 September 1988 »
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