Scratch 1 billion dollars of F-22's

Read the forum code of contact

Member for

17 years 5 months

Posts: 8,980

Ouch
Hurricane Michael damaged up to 12 F-22s that were unable to leave Tyndall AFB, Fla., as the storm advanced, with many possibly damaged beyond repair—a debilitating blow to the Air Force fifth-generation fighter fleet,

http://www.airforcemag.com/DRArchive/Pages/2018/October%202018/October%2015%202018/Hurricane-Michael-Damages-F-22s-Left-at-Tyndall-New-Special-Warfare-Training-Wing-Activated-SOUTHCOM-US-Forces-Korea-Nomine.aspx

Original post

Member for

24 years 2 months

Posts: 5,396

They can be repaired given enough time and money. Those damaged F-22s would make good candidates to be the initial batch to undergo mid-life update.

Member for

15 years 3 months

Posts: 6,441

Could these be some of the Block 20's F-22? If some of those are damaged, perhaps a more economical solution would be to use them as Spares parts

Member for

8 years 5 months

Posts: 126

so stupid. you figure they would have done more to protect them. If they couldn't fly. truck or ship them out. put them in an HAS, among many others.

Member for

14 years 11 months

Posts: 3

Obviously Russia was able to hack the weather ;)

Member for

9 years 9 months

Posts: 1,765

Given that Tyndall in Florida has also the function of a OCU unit it's very probable they were of the first batches or for what i have read, already grounded one.

Problem is that the F-22 is already in a process of MLU, so its own operative readiness, low even in normal times, would fall down now to abysmal level.

While however a normal update would mean to move to a common standard to another one, repairing damaged planes have to be performed individually, so it would take a lot longer.

Member for

6 years 2 months

Posts: 550

It beggars belief that these aircraft were not moved beforehand. Someone should bear responsibility for this.

Member for

16 years 5 months

Posts: 305

[QUOTE

It beggars belief that these aircraft were not moved beforehand. Someone should bear responsibility for this.

][/QUOTE]

My thoughts too St John, who ever was responsible for this should get either demoted or the sack when they find out the damage to the F-22's.

Member for

24 years 2 months

Posts: 2,271

And how would you have moved unflyable aircraft? Tow them to another state?

A pity USAF doesn't believe in HAS. Maybe they should reconsider.

Member for

8 years 10 months

Posts: 234

Looks like they'll be flying again.

"TONIGHT: Our maintenance professionals will do a detailed assessment of F-22s @TeamTyndall before we can say w certainty that damaged aircraft can be repaired/sent back into the skies...Damage was less than we feared and preliminary indications are promising."


https://twitter.com/oriana0214/status/1051662847959289856?s=21

Member for

6 years 2 months

Posts: 550

Load them unto other transport, like a lorry or C-5.

Member for

16 years

Posts: 353

St. John. I think you underestimate the logistics of transporting F-22's via C-5 or "lorry". The wingspan is 44 feet and tail span is 29 feet. For either method the wings, vertical and horizontal stabilizers would need to be removed, and it would take a tremendous amount of work and would still be an oversized load for ground transport. Having oversized loads on the highways in the middle of an evacuation with tens of thousands of people on the road is not a good idea.

Member for

6 years 2 months

Posts: 550

That seems like a whole shed load less work than trying to fix a dozen storm-battered stealth fighters. But I agree that a C-5 would probably be the way to go, not lorry.

Member for

16 years 2 months

Posts: 270

With respect, to take them out on C-5s would require a few things: First, you'd have to find 20 or so available C-5s. Then, you'd have to fly them there. Meanwhile you'd need to get people trained in major disassembly of F-22s to the planes, along with the very specialized equipment to do that. After they were disassembled you'd have to have enough of the necessary equipment necessary to load F-22s into C-5s there, do the actual loading and then fly them out. During this time, evacuation of the base is taking place. Since the storm was much milder (a tropical depression on Oct. 7) until the sudden change in its strength and speed (it didn't get to Category 4 until the day it hit Tyndall), you'd have maybe a couple of days at most to as little as a few hours to do all this. Good luck with that.

And trying to take them out by truck would have been even harder than that, by a lot.

Member for

6 years 2 months

Posts: 550

The storm was known about several days in advance, that's enough for an emergency response. I have seen an F-22 loaded into a C-5 before and I know it can be done. I also know that when the ASTRA(?) crashed at Boscombe Down in the UK it took only 36 hours to divert such resources from the other side of the Atlantic and have it gone.

Member for

16 years

Posts: 353

I agree with ST-21. Breaking down one F-22 (or ASTRA...) is very simple compared to what Tyndall was faced with. Although the storm was known about in reality they had abut 36-48 hours to really prepare. You can not do a massive breakdown every time there is a tropical disturbance in the region. In that time they have to generate every aircraft that can be made flyable, and I am sure there were some heroic efforts to get some of them into the air. During that same time frame thy need to secure the base, and ensure they and their families can get out safely in time (@24 hours before landfall- so you lose a day, you can't just leave a few hours before landfall).

How many people does it take to break down a F-22? How many crews are qualified to do so? How long will it take for Lockmart contractors to get there, and can they get in and out on time? How long does it take to break down a F-22? How many cradles do you have for F-22 transport aboard a C-5? How many jacks and cradles do you have for F-22 knockdown? Right people and equipment including specialists, hydraulics, de-fuelers? How many C-5's can you get there in time? Is the priority on generating flyable aircraft or breakdown? How many hours does it take to load a F-22 into a C-5? How many of your crews need to evacuate their families? Can you get the C-5 in, loaded, and out in time? Times all the above by @20 F-22's and you can better appreciate the problem.

While I agree that there are serviceability issues, and likely a few more hardened hangers would have been a good investment, "load 'em on a C-5" is not as easy as you imply.

Member for

6 years 2 months

Posts: 550

Well there needs to be a plan for the future, you can't have storms wiping out several expensive premier air superiority assets every time. Bunkers or hardened hangars would do, but there needs to be something.

Member for

17 years 7 months

Posts: 4,951

The hangars were designed for Category 3 storms. Maybe we should sprinkle them with magic pixie dust whenever a potential storm is coming. The base was already basically maxed out making the preparation they did do.

People don't understand the magnitude of this storm. It's an event that's only happened three times in American history and the cone spanned an area that contained hundreds of miles of potential entry points.

Member for

12 years 3 months

Posts: 5,905

Obviously. You are absolutely correct.
But if some airbases are fitted with appropriately constructed hangars (remember that we are not talking of a routinely used compound that does have to sustain the day to day heavily regulated activity), then perhaps the impact that have this kind of incident could be statically reduced.
The plan anyway was to park everything in this hangar what led to the potentially high damages rate since it was not able to sustain the wind gust experienced. So the planning is not faulty and makes senses. But the material (hangar design) or the objectives set were probably not adequate with the task or deemed strategic enough to be fully understood . It can be also that plans were not up to date with the rise of occurrence, costs of potential losses, shortened alert time and magnitude of such events). Was there a failure? Certainly. The question is not who to blame but, since we have here a systemic failure, how it could have been prevented.

My 2cts from far far away...