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mlmp08 posted:Mobile short-range sites can get early warning from surveillance radars as basic as your typical air traffic control radar. You can't fire with such a radar picture, but you know if something's out there. If those early warning radars are down, you can just blink, radiating off and on for very brief periods while relocating in between. You can then more or less guess when someone will be in range based on where they were the last couple times you radiated. Then you can radiate, lock on, fire, and cease radiate the instant it's possible without aborting your engagement and then relocate in a hurry. Does anyone still do acoustic locating?
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Jul 12, 2011 04:56
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Throatwarbler posted:How will you know where the enemy airplanes are without the radar running? IIRC there was some research done on tracking aircraft based on radio reflection from commercial sources (TV, Radio, ...). It was an article I read in the 90s, no idea about capabilities or commercial products. It offers the possibility to passively keep an eye on your airspace as long as your neighbours dont turn off all TV stations. The screenshot I remember was tracking commercial airliners.
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Jul 12, 2011 12:20
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karoshi posted:IIRC there was some research done on tracking aircraft based on radio reflection from commercial sources (TV, Radio, ...). It was an article I read in the 90s, no idea about capabilities or commercial products. It offers the possibility to passively keep an eye on your airspace as long as your neighbours dont turn off all TV stations. The screenshot I remember was tracking commercial airliners. I read about it in the late 90s too, but never heard anything more about it since. I suppose if the enemy knew you had such a system, they would send missiles at all the TV and cellphone control stations they can find anyway.
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Jul 12, 2011 12:58
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Frozen Horse posted:Does anyone still do acoustic locating? I know that if I was moving my radars regularly and they were off most of the time, I'd definitelly send a guy near their base with a cellphone to call his mama to tell her there's a thunderstorm brewing here.
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Jul 12, 2011 14:11
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gohuskies posted:Link to it here The conclusion to be drawn is: If your country is a possible target for NATO and a modern air force of a great enough scale is economically impossible then you need both the highest quality AD systems you can get AND highly motivated, intelligent and professional officers/SNCOs. I have no idea how it is in other forces, but in America ADA/LAAD postings tend to not be highly sought after. Likely because we have no real air threat that wont be destroyed on the ground or shortly after in a lopsided air battle. Perhaps in other nations, and I don't find this very likely, AD postings are of greater prestige than in American forces. edit: Essentially, Col. Zoltan was likely an outlier amongst AD officers. Moreover, his successes were as much the result of his own actions as well as the failings of NATO planners. vains fucked around with this message at 20:19 on Jul 12, 2011 |
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Jul 12, 2011 18:34
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This has only happened twice, too. Libya and the Balkans were some pretty weird circumstances. A NATO air campaign isn't something leaders should plan an air defense network around, it's probably not going to happen to most nations. If we're talking general peacetime NATO in a normal economic environment, outside of Europe, and you do something internal, chances are NATO won't care. Even throw the Russians into this, they have interventionist foreign policy, too. Keep the shenanigans down to a low level, you don't need an air defense network. Ratchet it up a notch to the point that world opinion is focused on whatever crazy poo poo you're trying to accomplish, you may get some sanctions and the resulting interdiction mission, but I don't think most despots care about that. A thriving black market is probably one of your selling points. Did you just invade your oil rich neighbor with Western ties? Congratulations, you are now involved in both a conventional and asymmetric war with a hyperpower and 5-30 allies from the land, air, sea and space! You've lost spectacularly!
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Jul 12, 2011 19:07
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SIGSEGV posted:While we're talking about mentality, were infantry (mechanised or not) / tank doctrines fundamentaly different between NATO and the USSR? If you're interested in USSR military doctrine, I'd strongly suggest reading this study of the Soviet war in Afghanistan by the Russian general staff. Pretty sure it has some very detailed analysis of infantry/tank doctrine and how it was forced to change during the war. If I had my copy to hand (it is at the bottom of a pile somewhere) I could quote some. It's very dry, but worth a read if you're interested in the period.
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Jul 12, 2011 20:16
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Danger - Octopus! posted:If you're interested in USSR military doctrine, I'd strongly suggest reading this study of the Soviet war in Afghanistan by the Russian general staff. Pretty sure it has some very detailed analysis of infantry/tank doctrine and how it was forced to change during the war. If I had my copy to hand (it is at the bottom of a pile somewhere) I could quote some. It's very dry, but worth a read if you're interested in the period. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bear-Went-Over-Mountain-Afghanistan/dp/0714644137/ref=pd_rhf_shvl_3 Same idea, some vignettes of Russian/mujaheddin engagements and the Soviet thinking that went into planning and executing the operations.
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Jul 12, 2011 20:23
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Thanks about those, by the way, I was bullshitting with old people a bit and there is nothing quite being told that "Yeah, he was proposed a chair at the Kandahar University around 40 years back, his wife opposed 'coz she knew he was gonna stare at Afghan chichs all day.".
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Jul 12, 2011 21:06
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Veins McGee posted:The conclusion to be drawn is: If your country is a possible target for NATO and a modern air force of a great enough scale is economically impossible then you need both the highest quality AD systems you can get AND highly motivated, intelligent and professional officers/SNCOs. Yeah, most countries don't really have to worry about NATO anyway, but I will say there are other countries that DO view air defense as prestigious, though mostly due to ballistic missile/rocket/mortar defense rather than air breathing threat (ABT: cruise missiles, UAV, helicopters, fixed-wing) defense. This is obvious in Kuwait and Israel in comparison to the USA. Also, when looking into the top of the line air defenses, look at what the top of the line builders, the USA and allies, have had to contend with. Patriot is very, very good at destroying pretty much any fixed-wing, manned aircraft as well as any UAV or cruise missile that does not have advanced, long-range, low-level navigation capabilities. It's pretty ok versus the advanced, low-level stuff. Virtually no upgrades to ABT threats have been made in the last 15 years aside from some low-RCS upgrades and anti-ARM/ASM (anti-radiation missile/air to surface missile) logic. The USA has some ABT projects, like JLENS, but 90% of emphasis on new ground-based air defenses in the US are based around ballistic missile defense. There have been massive upgrades to Patriot in the last 10 years regarding TBM defense, THAAD is under heavy testing and will be active sooner than later, Aegis is getting major ballistic missile defense upgrades, various other ABT-only radars have been convereted to TBM/ABT radars, etc. If the US was as concerned about ABTs as it is about TBMs, we'd see some very different weapons programs, but why spend so much Army/Navy/Homeland security money on ABT defense when you're pretty confident that the Air Force has it handled? SIGSEGV posted:I know that if I was moving my radars regularly and they were off most of the time, I'd definitelly send a guy near their base with a cellphone to call his mama to tell her there's a thunderstorm brewing here. There's that, but for that matter if you have a Marine LAAD unit out there with a stinger and he hears planes coming but can't see them or shoot them, you better believe he's reporting it up the chain if he's worth a drat. edit: besides, it's better than knowing nothing, but if you have a larger area to cover and some informant tells you 4 F-16s took off at X time, it doesn't really tell you what short-range air defense sector they're heading toward. If you really have no surveillance capability, better would be the kind of simple setup the Flying Tigers used of just a lot of people networked with phones and radios to report things they saw or heard and which way it was heading. mlmp08 fucked around with this message at 00:51 on Jul 14, 2011 |
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Jul 14, 2011 00:43
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SIGSEGV posted:I know that if I was moving my radars regularly and they were off most of the time, I'd definitelly send a guy near their base with a cellphone to call his mama to tell her there's a thunderstorm brewing here. I was thinking more about the big ear-trumpets you used to see as a way to get a bearing on aircraft and for artillery counter-battery fire back in WW1. With modern electronics rather than ears, a phased array over a broad area of countryside could tell you exactly where everything in the air is, similar to passive sonar.
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Jul 14, 2011 01:30
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Frozen Horse posted:I was thinking more about the big ear-trumpets you used to see as a way to get a bearing on aircraft and for artillery counter-battery fire back in WW1. With modern electronics rather than ears, a phased array over a broad area of countryside could tell you exactly where everything in the air is, similar to passive sonar. Sort of. Sound waves reflect and get blocked by terrain in supposedly predictable but in reality very comples and flat out wierd ways. Low-level aircraft could still use terrain masking. High level aircraft would probably be going fast enough to render targeting data useless. Neat idea though. Kind of like shotfinder.
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Jul 14, 2011 03:17
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Frozen Horse posted:I was thinking more about the big ear-trumpets you used to see as a way to get a bearing on aircraft and for artillery counter-battery fire back in WW1. With modern electronics rather than ears, a phased array over a broad area of countryside could tell you exactly where everything in the air is, similar to passive sonar. These things: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_mirror
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Jul 14, 2011 03:31
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Veins McGee posted:http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bear-Went-Over-Mountain-Afghanistan/dp/0714644137/ref=pd_rhf_shvl_3 http://www.amazon.com/Afghan-Guerrilla-Warfare-Mujahideen-Fighters/dp/0760313229/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310611211&sr=1-1 Same thing, one of the same authors, but from the Mujahideen perspective. In fact, they even describe a couple of the same actions, but from the other side.
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Jul 14, 2011 03:42
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mlmp08 posted:Yeah, props to him, but it had a lot to do with stupid USAF planning that won't be repeated. Also, the F-117 is/was not very drat stealthy. Been away from the thread for a few days, but just wanted to point out that this is a huge understatement right here...like, the incompetence in the planning for those strikes rivaled that of the '72 Christmas Bombings, which is really saying something. One would think it wouldn't be repeated, but then again we probably figured we wouldn't repeat the Christmas Bombings either. And yes, there's a good reason why we retired the F-117 a few years after that. Throatwarbler posted:I read about it in the late 90s too, but never heard anything more about it since. I suppose if the enemy knew you had such a system, they would send missiles at all the TV and cellphone control stations they can find anyway. Why take out all those towers when you can just turn off the power? VikingSkull posted:Even throw the Russians into this, they have interventionist foreign policy, too. Keep the shenanigans down to a low level, you don't need an air defense network. Although to their credit, they used their SA-11s and MANPADS to reasonably good effect/ agadhahab posted:http://www.amazon.com/Afghan-Guerrilla-Warfare-Mujahideen-Fighters/dp/0760313229/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310611211&sr=1-1 That's an updated version of the aptly named "The Other Side of the Mountain" (the one about the Soviets was originally titled "The Bear Went Over the Mountain.")
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Jul 14, 2011 04:38
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Veins McGee posted:The conclusion to be drawn is: If your country is a possible target for NATO and a modern air force of a great enough scale is economically impossible then you need both the highest quality AD systems you can get AND highly motivated, intelligent and professional officers/SNCOs. I think another thing that was learned through the Yugoslavian experience is that fairly low tech stuff like simply having lots of decoys and mocked up vehicles contributed a great deal towards most of the JNA emerging from the fracas intact. A cruise missile that hits an empty building is just as good as a cruise missile shot down. One can expect that the hypothetical competent air defence will include at least 3 fake SAM sites or other targets for every real one.
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Jul 14, 2011 04:53
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Great thread--here's an interesting story about a guy that's obsessed with finding out about how the original atomic bombs were constructed. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/12/15/081215fa_fact_samuels Also, Project Horizon, the USAF plan to establish a lunar base. (Sure, everybody makes fun of the Davy Crockett, but they would have come in handy if we had had to fight the russians ON THE MOON.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Horizon
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Jul 14, 2011 05:36
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^^Fake sites as well as fake emitters. I'll trade microwave ovens, or their more convincing equivalent, for anti-radiation missiles all day long.Smiling Jack posted:Sort of. Sound waves reflect and get blocked by terrain in supposedly predictable but in reality very comples and flat out wierd ways. Low-level aircraft could still use terrain masking. High level aircraft would probably be going fast enough to render targeting data useless. High-level aircraft will still be found at the centre of the wave pattern that the array of microphones are picking up. The easiest case to visualize (other cases are similarly solvable, just less easy to describe) is an aircraft flying at supersonic speed above a flat countryside. Its sonic boom trails behind it in a cone shape that intersects with the ground. As one would expect, this produces a conic intersection in the form of a parabola moving across the ground behind the aircraft. A mesh of sensors can detect this shock wave's passage, and one can then solve for the velocity, direction, and altitude of the aircraft based on the shape and velocity of the parabola. Deconvolving multiple manoeuvring aircraft is best left as an exercise for a computer. Terrain complicates things, but you do have the phase as well as intensity of the wave to work with. Terrain simplifies things too. If your sensor in Canyon B detects a whoosh whilst sensors in Canyons A and C detect nothing, you might expect to find the cruise missile cresting the pass at the end of Canyon B. Another ADA-idea has occurred to me. What of aerial mines in the form of a stealthy platform with a few solar panels and a sidewinder or similar missile slung from a stratospheric balloon? Have the system rely on entirely passive sensors with the missile set to fire when something catches its attention.
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Jul 14, 2011 06:10
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iyaayas01 posted:That's an updated version of the aptly named "The Other Side of the Mountain" (the one about the Soviets was originally titled "The Bear Went Over the Mountain.") Links to pdfs of "The Bear Went Over The Mountain" and "The Other Side Of The Mountain". You can also buy them cheap as nice books to hold and not read off a computer screen.
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Jul 14, 2011 08:29
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iyaayas01 posted:Although to their credit, they used their SA-11s and MANPADS to From what I've read anyway, the Russian planning in Georgia was more or less "eh, gently caress it". Seems like they just took whatever forces were local and went with it, because it's loving Georgia. I'm sure if it was a bit more thought out the Russians could have ended that in less than a week.
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Jul 14, 2011 18:41
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gohuskies posted:Links to pdfs of "The Bear Went Over The Mountain" and "The Other Side Of The Mountain". You can also buy them cheap as nice books to hold and not read off a computer screen. It's worth buying The Bear Went Over the Mountain just for the hilarious catalog that comes with it of other books from that publisher. Also, I've noticed a huge difference between Grau's commentary in BWotM and OSotM. In OSotM, he seems to be trying to provide a genuine critique of tactics and strategy aimed at educating prospective officers on the strengths and weaknesses of guerillas. This probably due to it being written later and his having seen the Soviet accounts of some of the same operations. BWotM, on the other hand, splits between critiquing the actions themselves, critiquing the Frunze Academy's take (they are the original authors), and pitching a manuscript for Rambo 3: the novelization.
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Jul 14, 2011 20:19
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Interesting SAM chat guys, I find it very interesting! One of my co-workers is Serbian; he wasn't part of the SAM crew, but he did join the hunt for the pilot of the -117. He has the oxygen bottle (his words, not mine), I'll see if I can't get a pic of that... Also, I keep expecting Caro to pop in at any moment and go batshit insane spergin' about fire-control radars. Good thing he's in Libya!
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Jul 15, 2011 00:57
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movax posted:Interesting SAM chat guys, I find it very interesting! One of my co-workers is Serbian; he wasn't part of the SAM crew, but he did join the hunt for the pilot of the -117. He has the oxygen bottle (his words, not mine), I'll see if I can't get a pic of that... How on earth is he not dead yet? Does the Russian industry have an equivalent to Iron Dome?
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Jul 15, 2011 04:03
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Lovin' this thread! Cold war history is always fascinating. While having dinner with my folks last week, dad was talking about his AF years based in Torrejón, Spain. His AF stories usually involve heavy drinking and/or sneaking back onto base after curfew, never mentioned anything noteworthy. This time though, he mentioned palomares so I asked what he knew about it. He's all "  What do I know about palomares? The most miserable four months of my life!"Turns out he was on scene with the recovery team from day one, ordered to comb the beach for debris. Everything they found was tagged and photographed, then dumped into a 50 gallon drum with all of the surrounding earth to prevent radiation from spreading. They only wore a jumpsuit and dustmask, which was incinerated when they returned to camp. The first day they had the badges that turn black when exposed to radiation, of course they had all turned by the end of the day. Next morning while suiting up someone asked for the badges only to hear "We won't be using those anymore." He gave me some photos and a book called "The Bombs of Palomares". Love the back cover quote.  Handy map inside the cover.  Dad at Camp Wilson.  Home sweet home.  Camp Wilson memorial bath house.  Recovery boats looking for bomb #4.   He has a fuckton of kodachrome slides too, need to get my hands on a slide scanner. Some Palomares Fun Facts: -The AF's first plan was to encase the whole drat town in a concrete sarcophagus like Bikini atoll. Franco was having none of that, of course. -It took the Army a week to get any tents setup, so they slept in the open, in the town square. It was the only place to get away from the wind that absolutely howled 24/7. -Only civilian vehicle to enter the cleanup area was the beer truck. For his trouble, dad got this nifty patch and certificate. No idea why he never showed me this stuff.  
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Jul 15, 2011 06:50
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On a trip to China last year I had dinner with a Chinese colonel and the topic drifted to the 2006 Y-8 crash. Basically China is trying to come up with an locally produced AWACS platform, the whole crew and development team got aboard the one plane they had as a testbed and it flew into a mountain. The whole AWACS development project is set back years. Every single officer in the chain of command up to the commander of the military region had a very bad year. I guess it was mildly amusing hearing all this stuff from someone who might be in the know.
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Jul 15, 2011 07:28
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So I have attained two of the four digital copies of photos inherited by my McDonnell Douglas great-uncle. They show him and a couple other scientists just chillin while the Gemini astronauts do their training. They are both autographed, BUT, my dad scanned them through the glass of the frames (they're so old that removing them will destroy the emulsion) so the quality is kind of poo poo, only John Glenn's Manly Mark of Godliness is easily distinguishable. Should I post them or not bother since the poor quality? If it helps, faces are distinguishable, just a weird contrast.
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Jul 17, 2011 11:53
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durtan posted:Should I post them or not bother since the poor quality? If it helps, faces are distinguishable, just a weird contrast.  Don't even ask, post it now!
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Jul 18, 2011 15:16
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I know it was posted a few pages back, but the Minuteman III stuff interests me, mostly because I was stationed at Minot AFB on the Bomb side of the base at 5th MUNS. I had plenty of space cop friends from the 91st, and I had managed to glean some information from them about the silos and LCFs and stuff. I have a map that I have been working on here with some of the active sites around Minot AFB, as well as some decommissioned ATLAS F sites near Altus AFB. Even though I worked at Minot AFB, working on this map really puts the whole "Scorched Earth" reality into perspective. I only have 33 of the 165 sites on the map at this time. Also, if anyone else is interested, I know a U2 and SR-71 pilot. His name is Col. William Lawson, and he is my friend's father-in-law. He has a distinction of being one of the few men who crashed an SR-71A while on an active mission during Vietnam. The next time I see my friend, I'll see if I could interview him for my fellow goons here. If I get the go-ahead, is there anything in particular you'd like to know?
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Jul 21, 2011 04:50
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Since you dudes love space ships so much, you should make your own: http://www.kerbalspaceprogram.com/ It's not the deepest thing ever, but its pretty neat. I just launched a spaceship into a stable orbit tonight  Then my astronauts died a horrible death on the dark side of the planet. Which at present causes anything that touches it to instantly explode.
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Jul 21, 2011 04:59
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Aciid c0d3r posted:I know it was posted a few pages back, but the Minuteman III stuff interests me, mostly because I was stationed at Minot AFB on the Bomb side of the base at 5th MUNS. I had plenty of space cop friends from the 91st, and I had managed to glean some information from them about the silos and LCFs and stuff. I have a map that I have been working on here with some of the active sites around Minot AFB, as well as some decommissioned ATLAS F sites near Altus AFB. Even though I worked at Minot AFB, working on this map really puts the whole "Scorched Earth" reality into perspective. I only have 33 of the 165 sites on the map at this time. I have a few: How did he crash an SR-71? Anything result from it apart from angels crying? What is flying it like? Any and all interesting stories he's willing to tell. Was the chair specifically modified for his big brass ones? Crashing from 100k must be intense. movax posted:
Work has been hell but it will be up the next day or two. I'm gonna do some P-shooping to try to sharpen the images, but I can't remember if CS2 can edit .pdf, we'll find out I guess. But I thought I'd chime in to let you know. The B-17 body photos also never surfaced, I mustve deleted them for some reason.
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Jul 21, 2011 07:10
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durtan posted:I have a few: Well the few details I know come from a report I found online somewhere. I am sure some google-fu could find more information. Basically he just finished re-fueling and was performing a full-power climb. He ended up going through a pretty major thunder storm that caused both of his engines to flare out and the Blackbird could not recover successfully. His back-seater started to panic when that happened, and Maj. Lawson ejected him and attempted to get the engines restarted. When that didn't work, he ejected himself. The plane crashed near U Tapau AB in Korea. Next time I see him, I'll see if I can't grab a few beers and get some more OPSEC-friendly information out of him.
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Jul 21, 2011 14:05
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Aciid c0d3r posted:His back-seater started to panic when that happened, and Maj. Lawson ejected him and attempted to get the engines restarted. Hohohoholllyyy shiitttt! THAT is how you fire someone! I don't like your attitude, therefore I have no choice but to eject you from this super sonic death trap over Asia.
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Jul 21, 2011 15:56
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Flanker posted:Hohohoholllyyy shiitttt! This is hilarious. "Major, you don't have the right stuff. You're fired!" Pulls ejection handle.
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Jul 21, 2011 16:00
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Serious questions: Was his co pilot injured at all? Did they remain buddies after? What happened to him? Was the pilot injured at all? How rough was the landing? How long was on his own for? What did he have for survival kit? 1911 etc?
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Jul 21, 2011 16:08
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I have a mental image of Hudson from Aliens - "GAME OVER MAN, GAME OVER!" freaking out in the back seat.
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Jul 21, 2011 18:31
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Aciid c0d3r posted:I know it was posted a few pages back, but the Minuteman III stuff interests me, mostly because I was stationed at Minot AFB on the Bomb side of the base at 5th MUNS. I had plenty of space cop friends from the 91st, and I had managed to glean some information from them about the silos and LCFs and stuff. I have a map that I have been working on here with some of the active sites around Minot AFB, as well as some decommissioned ATLAS F sites near Altus AFB. Even though I worked at Minot AFB, working on this map really puts the whole "Scorched Earth" reality into perspective. I only have 33 of the 165 sites on the map at this time. At one point, my local library had a large-format paperbound book that had a lot of details about the missile fields, and maps of each silo/command capsule/site, for the entire SAC missile deployment (at least what was unclassified/known). Damned if I can remember the name of the thing, it's been at least 6-8 years since I saw it. The strike-maps in the back of War Day (Whitley Strieber and James Kunetka, 1984) show that my home town (Great Falls, MT) was a death zone. (Middle of the Minutemen fields, *and* Malmstrom AFB right outside town.) I always figured that it was a minimum 45 minutes or so (minimal traffic, decent weather) to get to a safe distance in case of sudden Commie Attack, so... 
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Jul 21, 2011 22:43
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When I was stationed at Minot AFB, I definitely felt that way, especially on September 11th. We were at THREATCON DELTA which in my handbook read "threat of nuclear attack imminent." It's since been expanded upon, but at the time everyone at the base felt that we had our hands on the key. The WSA was locked down, and the base felt like a real SAC base again. Bombers fueled and ready to go, the whole nine yards. If you are interested I have updated the map further, and you can see at INDIA-10 there is a Minuteman III on the lift, either being loaded or unloaded for maintenance. Edit\/\/\/Thanks, Karma! Still going to finish mine though; it's kind of like Where's Waldo with nukes.\/\/\/ Aciid c0d3r fucked around with this message at 14:09 on Jul 22, 2011 |
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Jul 21, 2011 23:44
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Aciid c0d3r posted:I have a map that I have been working on here with some of the active sites around Minot AFB, as well as some decommissioned ATLAS F sites near Altus AFB. Let me save you some time. http://goo.gl/Pfyv7 <--kmz download http://goo.gl/Tb2h9 <--gmaps
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Jul 22, 2011 01:57
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Wasn't the Blackbird equipped with an ejection capsule? How do you just eject one person? Maybe they just threw him out the hatch going Mach 2.5 and wished him the best.
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Jul 22, 2011 07:48
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Aciid c0d3r posted:Well the few details I know come from a report I found online somewhere. I am sure some google-fu could find more information. Basically he just finished re-fueling and was performing a full-power climb. He ended up going through a pretty major thunder storm that caused both of his engines to flare out and the Blackbird could not recover successfully. His back-seater started to panic when that happened, and Maj. Lawson ejected him and attempted to get the engines restarted. When that didn't work, he ejected himself. The plane crashed near U Tapau AB in Korea. Slight correction...U-Tapao is in Thailand (it was a major US base during Vietnam) and I dug up a link that indicates that particular SR-71 actually crashed near Korat (another major U.S. base in Thailand during Vietnam). durtan posted:Wasn't the Blackbird equipped with an ejection capsule? How do you just eject one person? Nope, the Blackbird just has regular ejection seats...the protection was provided by the full pressure suits the crew wore. And it is possible to eject only one crewmember...aircraft with more than one crewmember these days usually have a switch of some sort is either "command," where any crew member can initiate an ejection for everyone, or "manual" where each crewmember has to eject manually. Back then, these systems weren't necessarily always in place; it depended on the aircraft. For example, the B-52 did not have a system installed originally: the crew depended on either a verbal bailout command or an "eject" light to initiate the sequence. Each crew member was responsible for ejecting themselves.
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Jul 22, 2011 12:14
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