Why do military aircraft crash so often?

[morkinva]

Passenger aircraft are of tried and true design (okay, except for the cessna). Many of the military aircraft are just of crappy design to begin with, like the boeing osprey.

Plus I don't think military pilots have faa licenses

 

[GoodRevrnd]

Originally posted by: kenleung
most military planes are fraggin old (F-14 anyone?)
with the technology today we can probably build cost efficient, high performance and less maintanence required planes.

See Boeing's JSF program or Lockheed Martin's JSF program. The latter one the contract October of last year.

EDIT: Oops. I see PsychoAndy beat me to the JSF thing. The Boeing variant of JSF (X32) was supposed to share ~80% common parts between Marines, Navy, and Airforce. I have no idea about Lockheed Martin (who got the contract), though I'm sure it was similar.

 

[Bignate603]

It's the same reason race car drivers crash alot more. If you push the limits you run more risks. In an airliner you don't do nearly as dangerous stuff, and they aren't designed to manuever like that. When you try to get more manueverabilty you sacrifice stability. Between that and flying, faster, lower and doing things to make them less of a target even if no one is shooting at them, they run more risks.

 

[Jerboy]

Originally posted by: Mookow

Originally posted by: DaiShan

Originally posted by: Jerboy
Because they push the limit much further?

Some of their maneuvers gives pilot as high as 20G(9.806m/s^2 x 20) of force.

Wrong. The maximum ammount of G-Forces that can be acheieved by a human being is around 6, some blackout a little earlier, some a little later, no more than 6 though usually. American Planes have what is known as fly by wire that do not allow them to exceed this ammount of force, hence there is no way that any plane in our military is giving 20g's of force.

They go more than 6. They have G-suits, which constrict to force blood out of your legs and to your head. I think they pull around nine, which is what a human IIRC can stand with a G-suit. Jerboy may be confusing the fact that an airframe can handle 20 G's, versus what a pilot can handle (less).

I thought I heard TLC/Discovery said G-suit allowed pilot to handle 20G's during sharp maneuvers. I don't remember for sure.

 

[SuperTool]

the democratic philosophy for our armed forces is as follows: have as little as possible while still being the #1 military super power, this will minimize the
threats every other country feels while still leaving us the best. the republican philosophy is as follows: have as much as possible at all times. you can never
have enough defense, or offense. if you have the money, and are capable, then you should and are obligated to spend it.

The problem is that Reagan didn't have the money. Which is why the debt grew by 3 trillion under his leadership. Bush doesn't have the money now either, and we will be in debt by a trillion more before this guy is done. Clinton could have blown the debt by another 2 trillion like Reagan, and give military all the stuff it wants, but that would be irresponsible. I am all for giving military priority within budget for things they really need, but to dig ourselves into deficits and risk the long term fiscal security of our country, higher future taxes, interest rates, and inflation just to give the military more toys is the wrong way to go.

 

[UltraQuiet]

I am all for giving military priority within budget for things they really need, but to dig ourselves into deficits and risk the long term fiscal security of our country, higher future taxes, interest rates, and inflation just to give the military more toys is the wrong way to go.

The problem during the '90's, and yes it did start with Bush Sr., is that we didn't have what we needed. Ther was no money for deployments, spare parts, classroom training, live ammo,etc,etc,etc. The mantra in the '90's was "Do more with less". It was until late in the Clinton admins term did the senior military people say "enough". Hindsight being what it is, Somalia really shouldn't have surprised anyone. We may have been in real trouble if, for instance, China invaded Taiwan and we had decided to intervene. Our state of readiness was not great, it was adequate at best. We trained and were funded for what was the perceived threat, which was none.

BTW, I've said it once and I'll say it again, Clinton, Bush Sr. and the Congress all share resposibility for the state of the military in the '90's. They also share responsibility for the current state of the CIA, FBI, etc.

 

[matmax]

because our previous great leader in his infinite wisdom slashed the sh#t out of the military budgets, so much so that they had to extend preventive maintenance of existing equipment beyond the recommended limits.

 

[Daxxax]

A C-130 is hardly cutting edge. It was first produced during the Vietnam War. Also, compared to the miles that a commercial airliner racks up, military planes fly relatively seldomly.

This is true that many Military planes are quite old, but they have had so many (upgrades) and repairs that the only orginal part is maybe the frame, I was in the Airforce for almost five years and I can tell you that after so many operating hours the planes go to what they call Depot Maintanance where they are taken apart, checked for problems and then reassembled. most of the time with new parts. I worked on B-52's that were made in 1957-59 but if you climbed up into the cabin it was pretty hightech stuff because of all the changes made over the years. The reason they seem to crash more the civilian planes is because a number of things most which have already been stated.

1.Bad Training
2.Bad maintanance
3.(pushing the envelope)
4.The news always reports every Military crash

 

[FrustratedUser]

Originally posted by: kenleung

Originally posted by: FrustratedUser

Originally posted by: kenleung
most military planes are fraggin old (F-14 anyone?)

with the technology today we can probably build cost efficient, high performance and less maintanence required planes.

No, not top-of-the-line fighters. They'll always be expensive to develop.

well,
i'd go for a universal airframe for fighters and making them reconfigurable for different missions. having one plane able to do different missions is a lot more cost efficient than having 2-3 different aircrafts. We have a lot of aging aircrafts that need to be replaced. I'm sure engineers can build something that can outfly F-14 and cheaper.

aircraft carrier landing requires skills and when they land their engine is at full throttle (afterburner or just throttle) just in case they miss they can fly back up. I also think they need to get newer weapons for aircrafts instead of just missiles. Laser and stuff would be nice.

Do we *really* need top of the line fighters today as russia being an ally and there are no more superpowers? Air power is for conventional warfare, not war against terrorism.

Yeah, someone needs to put up the money (taxpayers) + 20 years of development.
I lost you when you talked about 'laser and stuff'. Haven't you seen what happened in the Gulf and Afghanistan? That, sir, was top of the line aircrafts with 'laser and stuff' followed up by a classic bomb-carpet delivered by B52's.

 

[Nefrodite]

Originally posted by: FrustratedUser

Originally posted by: kenleung

Originally posted by: FrustratedUser

Originally posted by: kenleung
most military planes are fraggin old (F-14 anyone?)

with the technology today we can probably build cost efficient, high performance and less maintanence required planes.

No, not top-of-the-line fighters. They'll always be expensive to develop.

well,
i'd go for a universal airframe for fighters and making them reconfigurable for different missions. having one plane able to do different missions is a lot more cost efficient than having 2-3 different aircrafts. We have a lot of aging aircrafts that need to be replaced. I'm sure engineers can build something that can outfly F-14 and cheaper.

aircraft carrier landing requires skills and when they land their engine is at full throttle (afterburner or just throttle) just in case they miss they can fly back up. I also think they need to get newer weapons for aircrafts instead of just missiles. Laser and stuff would be nice.

Do we *really* need top of the line fighters today as russia being an ally and there are no more superpowers? Air power is for conventional warfare, not war against terrorism.

Yeah, someone needs to put up the money (taxpayers) + 20 years of development.
I lost you when you talked about 'laser and stuff'. Haven't you seen what happened in the Gulf and Afghanistan? That, sir, was top of the line aircrafts with 'laser and stuff' followed up by a classic bomb-carpet delivered by B52's.

didn't the b52s also have jdams?

 

[Ultima]

Skynet? Heh, just like in terminator. AI planes that can kick the ass of any human pilot.