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Where Have All The Pilots Gone
April 30,
2008: In the last month, U.S. Air Force UAVs (mainly MQ-1 Predators) have fired
a dozen Hellfire missiles in support of ground troops. That twice the monthly
number previously fired (in November 2006 and July 2007). Department of Defense
officials have been criticizing the air force for not doing as much as they
could (particularly with UAVs) to support the ground troops in Afghanistan and
Iraq. The Department of Defense currently has 5,000 UAVs, but most of them are
the small (under ten pound) ones used by the infantry, marines and Special
Forces. The air force predators can are unique in that they can stay in the air
for over 20 hours per sortie, and carry Hellfire missiles. The smaller UAVs can
stay up 90 minutes at a time, and carry no weapons. The latest UAV to show up
is the Reaper. While the original Predator was a reconnaissance aircraft that
could carry weapons (two Hellfire missiles, each weighing a hundred pounds),
the Reaper was designed as a combat aircraft
that also does reconnaissance. The 4.7 ton Reaper has a wingspan of 66
feet and a payload of 1.7 tons. The Reaper can carry over half a ton of GPS or
laser guided 500 pound bombs, as well as the 250 pound SDB, or Hellfire
missiles. The Reaper also carries
sensors equal to those found in targeting pods like the Sniper XL or Litening,
and flies at the same 20,000 foot altitude of most fighters using those pods.
This makes the Reaper immune to most ground fire, and capable of seeing, and
attacking, anything down there. All at one tenth of the price of a manned
fighter aircraft.
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