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Aviation History
1993
1993 - 0032.PDF
The T-45 is also equipped with UHF and VHF radios, which means students can practise coupled instrument approaches to prepare for the automatic carrier-landing system which fleet aircraft use to make carrier landings at night. "With the current system, pilots are just learning how to use [glideslope] needles by the time they get behind the boat at night," explains Cdr Richard Nelson, operations officer of the VT-21. Although one disadvantage of the T-45 is that it does not have guns, it does have a cont inuously computed impact-point mech anism which, com bined with the HUD camera, will allow the aircraft to be used for gun nery training. The biggest con cerns about how the T-45 will affect training stem from the fact that it is replacing two dis tinctly different air craft. "With only the T-45, the diversity of flying different aircraft will be lost," says Ault, who is a former TA-4 squadron commander. There will also be some drawbacks from the fact that, with the T-45, MDC had to strike a balance somewhere between the straight- wing T-2 and the high-performance A-4 attack aircraft. "The T-2 is a terribly forgiv ing aeroplane," Ault says. "Students may have a hard time going straight from the [Beech] T-34 into the T-45." On the other end of the spectrum, the T-45 does not have the manoeuverability of the A-4, which may limit its performance in areas such as air-combat manoeuvring (ACM). Some of these problems may be mitigated as the naval-aviation programme upgrades continue to evolve, however. The new joint primary aircraft training system (JPATS) aircraft will undoubtedly make the gap between the primary trainers and the T-45 smaller, and the T-45's digital cockpit mod ifications should make transitioning into fleet aircraft easier. VT-21 instructors who have flown the T-45 also say that, while the Goshawk is less manoeuverable than the A-4, it maintains energy better. Even the fact that students will complete both their intermediate and advanced in struction in only one aircraft will have an advantage in that less time will have to be spent on familiarisation training. As a re sult, the T-45 training program is projected to require only 175.6 flight hours instead of the current 190h which students spend in the T-2 and TA-4. THE T45TS A unique aspect about the whole T-45 training system (T45TS) is that it is com plete from the start. "This is the first training system ever put in from the ground up in the Navy and, as far as I know, any military in the world," comments Cdr Dean Fournier, commanding officer of the VT-21. "Normally, we get an aeroplane and then, Landing on Forrestal's angled deck takes place while take-offs catapult from the joredeck. The T-45 has a nose-tow catapult link two years later, we get a simulator, and we're always sort of behind, trying to catch up on the academics." In addition to the aircraft itself, the McDonnell Douglas T45TS consists of both instrument and visual simulators, electronic classrooms and interactive computer work stations, all co-ordinated through a comput erised training integration system (TIS). McDonnell Douglas is the prime contractor on all the components, and will provide all the logistics support for the programme. The T-45 is the first naval-aviation trainer to come with visual simulators. The Navy has ordered 18 of the Hughes Training operational flight simulators at an approxi mate cost of $16 million each. The simula tor visual system field of view stretches 30° above and below the nose of the aircraft, 105° to the left and 75° to the right, enabling students to practise most manoeu vres. ACM instructors at Kingsville rated the flying qualities of the T-45 simulator as "better than the F/A-18 simulator, with a faster response time", although they say that some data still needs to be put into the simulator to make it fly a little more like the actual aircraft. The simulators are fixed-base, but the sensation of g forces is created through a combination of inflatable bladders in the seat, movable shoulder and lap harnesses and inflation of the g suit worn by the student. Students can practise formation flying, day and night carrier approaches in various weather conditions, air-to-air target, gunnery range operations, and cross country navigation over computer-repro duced images of the areas around NAS Kingsville and NAS Meridian, where the T-45 squadrons will be based. When the T-45 programme is fully opera tional, students will get a total of 96h of visual and instrument simulator training. Since the T-45 programme has been de layed, however, the Navy has starting using the T-45 simulators on a limited basis in both T-2 and TA-4 training. Students in both air craft are now receiving two carrier-landing practice sessions in the T-45 simulators before going out to the ship, and TA-4 students have another two prac tice sessions in weap ons delivery before going on their weap ons-training detach ment. "We'll have to do a quantitative and qualitative analysis to see if it makes a differ ence," Cdr Fournier says, "but we've heard that it has helped [TA-4] students pick up things a lot faster on their weapons detachment, because they have already visu alised what it's going to look like." The simulators are not the only high- technology element of the T-45 ground training system, however. Lectures will be presented in "electronic classrooms", featur ing a computerised video screen which is able to present information in a wide variety of formats. Diagrams of aerial or combat manoeuvres can be drawn by the computer as either dotted-line or "ribbon" displays and slowed down, frozen or replayed at any point during their presentation. If an instructor 30 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 6 - 12 January, 1993
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