Saturday - May 07, 2011

Secret No Longer

Osama Raid Stealth Chopper Secret Tech Lost To China?

LOS ANGELES (KABC)—The last act of the Navy SEAL team before they left the Osama bin Laden compound was to blow up their damaged helicopter that had to be left behind.

Aviation analysts say the remnants of the aircraft reveal they were part of one of the U.S. military’s most closely-guarded secret: A stealth Black Hawk helicopter whose existence was only rumored. It had never been seen in public before.

“This is the first time we’ve seen an operation stealth helicopter,” said Bill Sweetman, editor in chief of Defense Technology International magazine.

Analysts say photos that emerged on the Internet reveal it was no ordinary helicopter.

“One of the things that really stands out is they have a little disk over the motors, which is meant to baffle the sound and deny radar signature,” said Daniel Goure of the think tank Lexington Institute.

Neighbors in the Abbottabad neighborhood where bin Laden’s compound was located told ABC News they did not hear the helicopters Sunday night until they were directly overhead.

“It would be a vague sound,” Goure said. “It might be the sound of a helicopter that was going in the opposite direction. This was designed so the time between hearing the helicopter and the SEALs dropping in on the compound was very short.”

Residents near the bin Laden compound told ABC News that just before the stealth helicopters arrived, all electricity and cellphone service was knocked out and then came back on right after the choppers left.

One key to the chopper’s stealth nature is a secret, heavily-coated, fabric-like material, which children in the neighborhood were seen collecting.

The Chinese military is known to have close relationships with the Pakistani military.

“There are probably people in the Pentagon tonight who are very concerned that pieces of the helicopter may be, even now, on their way to China, because we know that China is trying to make stealth aircraft,” said ABC News consultant Richard Clarke.

The remaining large pieces of the secret U.S. helicopter were trucked away by Pakistani officials Wednesday to an unknown destination.

One of the helicopters was blown apart during the assault, but photographs of the tail section that remained in Pakistan show modifications to quiet noise and reduce chances of radar detection.

The New York Times reports that people in the helicopter industry said the rear section looked nothing like the tail of a regular Black Hawk helicopter. They said it looked like the Black Hawk had added some of the features of the proposed stealth helicopter Comanche, which was canceled by the Pentagon in 2004.

Another reported that the downed helicopter had five or six blades in its tail rotor, as opposed to the usual four in a Black Hawk. That may have permitted operators to slow the rotor speed and reduce the familiar chop-chop sound made by most helicopters.

Daniel Goure, a defense specialist at the Lexington Institute think tank, said the helicopter crash may have been caused by the unusual aerodynamics which came from the aircraft’s modifications.

“It could be much more difficult to fly at slow speed and landing than you would expect from a typical Black Hawk,” Goure said

What is as intriguing as the stealth adaptations is how well they apparently worked. “The attack on bin Laden did not occur in some remote area outside Pakistani control, but in a compound in a city of some 100,000 and less than 100 mi. from a major Pakistani population center like Islamabad, and one occupied by a brigade from the Pakistani army’s second division and the location of the Army’s military academy,” notes analyst Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic & International Studies.

The public photos show that the destroyed Black Hawk’s tail features stealth-configured shapes on the boom and the tail-rotor hub fairings, swept stabilizers and a “dishpan” cover over a five- or six-blade tail rotor. It has a silver-loaded infrared (IR) suppression finish similar to that seen on the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey.

Stealth enhancements for rotorcraft are not new and were applied extensively to the Boeing/Sikorsky RAH-66 Comanche, canceled in 2004. Compared with fixed-wing stealth, more emphasis is usually placed on noise and IR signatures.

Link to a drawing that shows the rotor better

We’ll never know what other modifications the main body of that helo had, because it got burned up. And while making a quieter helo is great, and cutting down it’s radar cross section is superb, the part I really like is that with the flip of a switch our guys can shut down their electric power and their phone system remotely. I’m pretty sure that isn’t exactly new; I think the IDF has been doing that for awhile now too, but it sure is neat.

a bit more info at Freep

Posted by Drew458     on 05/07/2011 at 09:07 AM   
Filed Under: • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles • War On Terror •  
• Comments (3) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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