Mystery Helicopter

[SethJS 0]

According to this DailyMail story (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1382859/Osama-bin-Laden-dead-Photo-Obama-watching-Al-Qaeda-leader-die-live-TV.html) it looks like four helos went in, and due to the destruction of the one left behind, the other three were used to pull the team out. It's my understanding that the intention may have been to remove additional OBL's family members and/or guards, but they weren't able to and had to leave them behind because of the disabled helicopter.

[Chock 17,769]

There was probably a back up chopper or two and certainly there would have been SAR and medevac choppers at a holding point to support the main force in case things went awry. In fact there was probably an entire reserve back up squad also trained in completing the mission in case the first team didn't make it.When it comes to military missions and especially covert ops ones, they are unlikely to ever reveal all the tactical details, for obvious reasons, and may even deliberately put out erroneous info, and curiosity aside, we should understand why that is so and not want it otherwise. But let's put it this way, if I'd been hunting a target for ten years and finally got my chance to get at them, I'd be damn sure that every angle was covered, after all, the last time they tried to get the target, they used too few troops thinking it would be a walkover, and the target slipped away. Thus I'm assuming that there were units all over the place for that contingency, based on the notion that they weren't gonna make the same mistake again. So that'd be everything from diversionary raids keeping radars and potential fighter opposition busy and all kinds of other clever stuff in addition to the guys actually on the main mission.Here's an example of that kind of clever stuff such sneaky special units get up to, which just goes to show that they generally know what works: Many years ago, there was an airliner that got hijacked and landed in Africa, and there was a plan to storm the aircraft whilst it was on the ground. But rather than simply go for it, what they did was wait until the nighttime, and then at about 3am, the spec ops guys set fire to a big pile of rubbish across the airfield more or less directly in front of the airliner. They did that so the terrorists would all be curious as to what that fire could be, and they all went up to the cockpit for a look, which is when the attack commenced. As a result, none of the passengers were hurt in the assault. Clever stuff eh? But such ideas only work if you don't make them too well known, so details like that rarely get mentioned.Al

[ZachLW 37]

The team of "Seals" did a fine job of destroying the chopper. I heard incendiary grenades and the like were used to destroy most of the chopper (obviously besides the tail section).

[dmaher 0]

Excuse my lack of knowledge when it comes to helos, but I'm curious about how it's been reported that there were two going in and only one made it out. The limited reading I've done said there were 25 members of the U.S. force involved in the mission. Is that number what others have gleaned from around the web? If so, they all came out on one helo? And had some additional payload versus when they went in. So is the two incoming accurate, leaving one outgoing? If so, wouldn't that exceed the payload (published, at least) for a UH-60? Maybe there was a stretched version?Overall, I'm left with the thought that there was more than two going in or if that is the case, then the one going away seems to be something heavily modified and enlarged or something people don't know about? No conspiracy theory proposed, I'm just trying to make the reported numbers add up, both in manpower and equipment.

If I recall, (from local TV news) there were 2 additional helicopters standing by - just beyond the border - at leats one was a chinook.I'll believe a 'quiet' blackhawk when I see it ;)But - there's a, much smaller, helicopter that flies in my area that's downright pleasant, it's so quiet. Even on a peaceful evening.Must be those short rotors, I guess.

[tf51d 284]

The notion of a 'stealth helicopter always makes me laugh; I guess that'd be a helicopter you can only hear from three miles away instead of six LOL. Of course, I know it will really be about radar returns and jamming rather than sound levels, since there isn't really a great deal they can do about the supersonic slap noises a rotor blade makes beyond sweeping the tips back a bit, but they can certainly do something about spoofing laser and IR seekers.That tail wreckage does more or less look like the UH-60's layout as far as the elevator and rotor position in relation to one another are concerned, even though there are clearly some radical differences such as the sweep of the elevators, so it may indeed be a tarted up Blackhawk, but it clearly isn't some knocked up five minute field modification. It's certainly intriguing.Time to take the hammer to my Alphasim Blackhawk I guess... :( Al

The US actually did develop a Stealth Helicopter called the RAH-66 Comanche. It was a Gunship, and was suppose to be the successor to the Apache until the project got cancelled. There were flyable prototypes produced though. (Like the F-19, they made a video game out of this too). In addition there are unmanned helicopters in use today that is said to have stealth characteristics.

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

Too bad the Americans lost this helicopter. Looks like Pakistan could sell the wreckage to China so they can analize the materials.

[Chock 17,769]

The US actually did develop a Stealth Helicopter called the RAH-66 Comanche. It was a Gunship, and was suppose to be the successor to the Apache until the project got cancelled. There were flyable prototypes produced though. (Like the F-19, they made a video game out of this too). In addition there are unmanned helicopters in use today that is said to have stealth characteristics.

The RAH-66 wasn't actually supposed to be the replacement for the AH-64 Apache, it was intended to be a supplement to types such as the OH-58 Kiowa Warrior and the OH-6 Cayuse, i.e. it was not an all-out gunship, but rather more of an armed reconnaissance type with some stealth characteristics. This was so it could more safely pop up from the cover of trees to designate targets and datalink the target acquisition info to AH-64 Apaches whereupon they would launch Hellfire missiles from behind cover, the main scenario being engaging main battle tanks on the open plains of Germany if the Cold War ever kicked off.The notion of making the recon choppers harder to target was based on combat experience in Vietnam (which is also the experience that led to the Blackhawks design to replace the Huey). In Vietnam, it was the recon choppers such as the Kiowa and the Cayuse that suffered the most attrition. The US Army canceled the RAH-66 because the role which was envisioned to be its main combat scenario became increasingly unlikely after the Berlin Wall came down, and instead the OH-58 and the AH-64 Longbow variant got telescoping target designator masts mounted above the main rotor hub which are the only bit that gets exposed to the target when they are raised.Unmanned helicopters with stealth characteristics are mainly based on either the MH-6 or more often the civilian Hughes 500 version; they are intended largely to be a cheap UAV solution for foreign armies and export sales. although US special forces units do use the MH-6.Al

[Lifeguard911 9]

In studying the photos, one of the more interesting things is that there appears to be no visible rivets, screwheads, bolts, etc. visible in any of the photos. I know that a smooth surface is one key ingredient of stealth design, but given the amount of maintenance needed on moving parts like a tail rotor, it must make maintenance a real pain on this helicopter. Also, the tail is not entirely the uniform grey "stealth" color. The underside of the tail cone is black or dark grey with a sharp demarcation line which indicates it is a seperate panel and not a shadow. An antenna housing perhaps? There is also a dark diamond shape on top of the rotor housing that might be a vent.The horizontal tailplane also appears to move the same way as the Blackhawk's does. At the base of the tailplane, you can see an arc panel that probably indicates the degree of sweep the tailplane moves through.

[Lifeguard911 9]

Update- A story I found on a Pakistan Defense website had a link to this story that says the crash was due to a vortex ring state developing as the helo came into land.Bloomberg

[Chock 17,769]

That's what you get for practicing on the Aerosoft Huey LOL (it doesn't simulate VRS)Al

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

The more you read about this the more you realize what happened. It seems the pilot didn't do anything wrong as he was conducting his mission as planned. He just flew into a phenomenon involving warm air and a high wall that prevented the lift required to maintain a hover. It is amazing no one was injured or killed in what was a risky moment in the mission, and that is due to the pilot falling back in his training when settled that chopper down in a split second decision. Hero’s in my books.

[Chock 17,769]

I think you are confusing a vortex ring state (also known as settling with power) with a density altitude problem. VRS is when the helicopter is descended too quickly and flies into its own turbulence from the rotor's downwash, the overspill also stalling some of the outer rotor blade area. It is invariably a pilot error when that occurs, since descending at a slower rate will avoid it entirely. That said, an increased density altitude caused by a warm or humid air mass will not help the situation if a chopper goes into a VRS, but they are certainly two different phenomena.It is true that the helicopter could have encountered warmer air at the mission site, and that wouldn't help if the chopper also needed to do a rolling take off because of weight at the start of the mission, using translational lift to get it off the deck, but it then flew a long way, burning off fuel, which would of course make it considerably lighter than when it took off, so who knows? It is also possible - indeed likely - that the mystery stealth bits on a Blackhawk (if that's what it was), could make it weigh much more than a standard Blackhawk and fool the pilot into expecting it to be able to land like a normal Blackhawk with that amount of fuel and payload on board, but then again that too would be a miscalculation on the pilot's part that he/she should really have been prepared for, although how much blame could be apportioned to that would depend on how much practice stick time they had in that fancy new chopper at operational weights.I'd still hesitate to point the finger of blame at the pilot(s) in spite of all this though, because it is all very well for me to analyse such things sat in a nice comfy chair, and quite another to be flying a covert mission in an untried helicopter on what is probably the most important mission that pilot will ever fly and one the entire world is going to read about (hmm, no pressure then). So even if the pilot did make a mistake, it wasn't a fatal one, and it didn't compromise the actual mission, just the chopper design; and you can't really blame the crew for that, because if any mission planner expects to never lose a chopper in combat, then they've never read a history book about choppers in combat.Al

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

I am just basing what I am reading on the media reports (not the best source). Even still you have a pilot with a mission to get in there and I recognize the high risks involved. Truth is anything can happen in a moments notice. As time goes on more of this mission will come out and I find it really fascinating. The best of the best flying in like that in a top secret machine, and unfortunately there was just a little bit of collateral damage (loss of a helicopter). Not much is known about this machine other then perhaps it is the same platform as a Blackhawk (with stealth features). I do recall a Blackhawk crashing down the side of Mount Hood after it lost lift in a tight spot as well. Hard to comment on this one really as nothing is known about its performance publicly.They had some heavy lifters as back-up so it seams those (I assume two) stealth helicopters did their jobs in having an element of surprise. That was a key part of the mission. If they didn't lose one of them we probably still would not know of their existence. I am also sure their are many other aspects of this mission that will not be known for some time.

[Chock 17,769]

There will probably aspects of it that are never made public, since it would be foolish for a unit to successfully pull off a covert raid and then tell everyone exactly how it was all done when they may very possibly have to do something similar again in the future. In fact, it would make sense for them to throw a few porkies out there in any briefing they give the press, just to keep potential enemies guessing. Of course I and I'm sure everyone else would love to know all the details, but if that's at the expense of soldier's lives, then I'd much rather they told us a big pack of lies and kept their edge.Al

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

Absolutely. Even much about World War 2 was not made public until well into the 1950's & 1960's when technology and warfare moved on. When I am old and grey I will visit this in a museum as part of the History of the USA.Cheers