Quotulatiousness

February 21, 2013

RCAF still confident that Sea Kings will last long enough, hopefully

Filed under: Cancon, Military, Politics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 10:27

Sea King unit patchDid you know that the Canadian military is still waiting for the delivery of their new helicopters? This leaves the military brass with little to do but put on a show of confidence and perhaps cross their fingers behind their collective backs:

The head of the Royal Canadian Air Force says he’s confident the military’s 50-year-old Sea King helicopters can stay in the air long enough for their troubled replacements to arrive.

“It’s good for a while,” Lt.-Gen. Yvan Blondin said of the Sea Kings, in an exclusive interview with Postmedia News Wednesday.

“In the short term, the Sea King can fly. Eventually I’m going to replace some equipment on it if I want to keep it flying longer, but I’ve got flexibility.”

That flexibility will likely be needed amid recent reports that the air force won’t receive the first of its planned Sea King replacements, U.S. aerospace giant Sikorsky’s Cyclone maritime helicopters, until 2015 — seven years later than scheduled.

Here’s the long, twisted history of Canada’s attempt to replace the venerable Sea King helicopters:

  • In 1963, the CH-124 Sea King helicopter (a variant of the US Navy S-61 model) entered service with the Royal Canadian Navy.
  • In 1983, the Trudeau government started a process to replace the Sea Kings. That process never got far enough for a replacement helicopter to be ordered.
  • In 1985, the Mulroney government started a new process to find a replacement for the Sea Kings.
  • In 1992, the Mulroney government placed an order for 50 EH-101 Cormorant helicopters (for both naval and search-and-rescue operations).
  • In 1993, the Campbell government reduced the order from 50 to 43, theoretically saving $1.4B.
  • In 1993, the new Chrétien government cancelled the “Cadillac” helicopters as being far too expensive and started a new process to identify the right helicopters to buy. The government had to pay nearly $500 million in cancellation penalties.
  • In 1998, having split the plan into separate orders for naval and SAR helicopters, the government ended up buying 15 Cormorant SAR helicopters anyway — and the per-unit prices had risen in the intervening time.
  • In 2004, the Martin government placed an order with Sikorsky for 28 CH-148 Cyclone helicopters to be delivered starting in 2008 (after very carefully arranging the specifications to exclude the Cormorant from the competition).
  • Now, in 2012, we may still have another five years to wait for the delivery of the Cyclones.

July 6, 2012

Maybe Obama has scaled back the War on Drugs

Filed under: Government, Law, Military, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 07:45

At least, that’s the highly charitable conclusion reached by some supportive media folks. Jacob Sullum explains how they came up with this revelation:

One-upping GQ‘s Marc Ambinder, who recently predicted that Barack Obama “will pivot to the drug war” in his second term if he is re-elected, The Daily Beast‘s James Higdon claims the president already has scaled back the crusade to stop Americans from altering their consciousness in politically disfavored ways. Higdon’s evidence: less money in the administration’s fiscal year 2013 budget for marijuana-spotting helicopters. Seriously:

    Until now, the DEA and state law enforcement could count on the National Guard to fly hundreds of helicopter hours over national forests and other public land, where growers became active following the passage of property-seizure laws in the Reagan years—but the FY13 budget changes that.

    The 50-percent cut is not being apportioned evenly across the states — it’s a two-thirds cut in Oregon and a 70-percent cut in Kentucky, while the Southern border states are receiving less severe reductions in funding. It’s essentially a diversion of Defense Department assets away from the interior American marijuana fields to where the national-security risk is greatest: along our Southern border.

Higdon sees this budgetary rejiggering, which by his own admission will have no impact on the amount of marijuana supplied to or consumed by Americans, as a landmark on “the road map to pot decriminalization.”

I guess you need to pretend there’s a pony somewhere when you’re digging through that much horse shit.

July 4, 2012

Canada’s new Cyclone helicopters — already 4 years late — may not arrive for another 5 years

Filed under: Cancon, Military, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:32

Greg Weston reports for CBC News:

Canada’s long-promised fleet of new Sikorsky naval helicopters, already four years late and $300 million over budget, likely won’t be delivered and ready for combat for up to another five years, informed industry sources tell CBC News.

Last month, Connecticut-based Sikorsky missed its latest contract deadline to finish delivering 28 sleek, state-of-the-art Cyclone maritime helicopters to replace Canada’s aged fleet of increasingly unreliable Sea Kings, now nearing 50 years old.

In fact, delivery of the new choppers hasn’t even started.

[. . .]

As of last month, Sikorsky had only provided a couple of prototypes that have no military mission systems, and aren’t certified to fly over water or at night.

The two helicopters apparently spend most of their time on the tarmac at Shearwater Heliport at CFB Halifax as “training aids” for ground mechanics.

The machines are so incomplete the Canadian government refuses to accept them as an official delivery of anything in the contract.

What is it about helicopters in particular that makes it so difficult and so expensive for the Canadian government to acquire? Here’s the sad chronology:

  • In 1963, the CH-124 Sea King helicopter (a variant of the US Navy S-61 model) entered service with the Royal Canadian Navy.
  • In 1983, the Trudeau government started a process to replace the Sea Kings. That process never got far enough for a replacement helicopter to be ordered.
  • In 1985, the Mulroney government started a new process to find a replacement for the Sea Kings.
  • In 1992, the Mulroney government placed an order for 50 EH-101 Cormorant helicopters (for both naval and search-and-rescue operations).
  • In 1993, the Campbell government reduced the order from 50 to 43, theoretically saving $1.4B.
  • In 1993, the new Chrétien government cancelled the “Cadillac” helicopters as being far too expensive and started a new process to identify the right helicopters to buy. The government had to pay nearly $500 million in cancellation penalties.
  • In 1998, having split the plan into separate orders for naval and SAR helicopters, the government ended up buying 15 Cormorant SAR helicopters anyway — and the per-unit prices had risen in the intervening time.
  • In 2004, the Martin government placed an order with Sikorsky for 28 CH-148 Cyclone helicopters to be delivered starting in 2008 (after very carefully arranging the specifications to exclude the Cormorant from the competition).
  • Now, in 2012, we may still have another five years to wait for the delivery of the Cyclones.

Update: In the National Post, Kelly McParland tries to draw some useful conclusions from the longest-running Canadian comedy act:

If there is a solution to this farce it’s not easily identified. Canada desperately needs the helicopters and it is far too late to return once again to the drawing board. The blame is so widespread that politicians barely bother to bestir themselves to try: if Jean Chretien’s government hadn’t maliciously cancelled Brian Mulroney’s original 1992 purchase, a full decade might have been cut from the script, but there is no guarantee other mishaps wouldn’t have occurred. Ottawa’s only option now is to hound Connecticut-based Sikorsky relentlessly and mercilessly, recover every cent possible for its repeated failure to live up to its promises, and accept nothing less than full compliance with its contracted responsibilities.

The greater lesson lies in the nether world that surrounds military procurement. It’s a world where no promise can be accepted as reliable, no cost guarantee assumed to be binding, no contract treated as worth the paper it’s written on. The federal Conservatives should think long and hard on the Sea King saga as they push ever deeper into their own purchase of new fighter jets, whether the F-35 or otherwise. Prime Minister Stephen Harper would be well-advised to abandon his usual aggressive approach and tread warily. The uncertain costs, the shifting due dates, the obdurate insistence of the military mandarins on having their way, the determined stonewalling of the politicians : it has all the identifying markings of a Sea King re-make.

Update the second: On Facebook, Damian Brooks suggests that Kelly McParland is only able to see the humour because he hasn’t been close enough to the situation: “I’d be curious to know if McParland’s ever flown in one of our Sea Kings, with tranny fluid dripping down the fuselage, practicing autorotations ad nauseum (literally). I suspect not. If he had, I have a feeling he’d find the situation much more disgraceful and much less funny.” He also posted a link to this:

December 9, 2011

US Marine Corps has to economize on V-22 Osprey . . . by buying more helicopters

Filed under: Military, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:39

The USMC is very happy with their V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor for its speed and durability, but it is still far more expensive than ordinary helicopters. As a result of the high individual cost of V-22’s, the USMC is having to buy upgraded CH-53 helicopters to carry some of the burden:

The U.S. Marine Corps recently admitted that the lifetime cost of operating their new V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft had increased 64 percent over the last three years (to $121.5 billion). Although the marines MV-22s have flown over 100,000 hours in Afghanistan and have an excellent safety and reliability record, they are very expensive. With major cuts in the defense budget coming, there is pressure to cease production of the MV-22, and put more money into cheaper helicopters. That is already happening.

Four years ago the U.S. Marine Corps began working on an updated version of their heavy, CH-53E, transport helicopters. The new version was the CH-53K. First flight of a CH-53K was to take place this year, with first CH-53Ks entering service in 2015. But now this has all been delayed. First flight won’t take place until 2013, and the CH-53K won’t enter service until 2018. Technical problems are blamed, although helicopter advocates imply that the marines don’t want to take money away from their MV-22 program to keep the CH-53K program on schedule.

There is still a lot of enthusiasm for the CH-53K. Two years ago, the marines decided to replace their elderly CH-53Ds with CH-53Ks, rather than the more expensive MV-22s. The CH-53K was to cost about $27 million each, compared to about three times that for an MV-22. However, delaying the introduction of the CH-53K will cost over a billion dollars, and add about $5 million to the cost of each CH-53K. Replacing the CH-53Ds means more CH-53Ks, for a total of about 200. It’s expected that the final costs of the CH-53D will be higher, but still about half the cost of an MV-22.


Image from Sikorsky website.

August 17, 2011

RCAF finds that equipment is easier to obtain than trained crews

Filed under: Cancon, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:08

From Strategy Page:

Canada is finding it’s easier to buy new helicopters, than find the people it needs to operate and maintain them. Such is the case with a new CH-47 transport helicopter squadron, which will require 482 pilots, maintainers and support staff. Pilots are in training, as are some of the maintainers.

The problems is that the Royal Canadian Air Force has only 14,500 personnel and it’s difficult to round up 482 specialists for a new squadron. The new unit does not reach full strength until 2014, and three years is believed sufficient to recruit or transfer the people needed for the new unit. But maybe not, because it’s always a problem with smaller armed forces in this age of ever evolving technology. The U.S. Air Force has 330,000 personnel, and has been downsizing for the last two decades. All those people give you a lot more flexibility, and fewer problems in forming new units.

Canada has been leasing and trying to buy CH-47s for the past four years. That’s because the CH-47 is the best helicopter for use in Afghanistan, having proved able to deal with the dust and high altitude operations better than other transport choppers. The CH-47 has been engineered, over the years, to deal with the dust, and always had the engine power to handle high altitude operations. For these reasons, Canada is buying fifteen more CH-47Fs and forming another air force squadron to operate them.

July 11, 2011

The long, quiet development of weaponry

Filed under: History, Military, Technology, Weapons — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:20

Strategy Page titled this one as “Four Decades To Become An Overnight Sensation”:

Wonder weapons, in general, aren’t. Those spiffy and seemingly magical new “wonder weapons” tend to be old weapons designs that finally got to the point where they lived up to the original hype. Take smart bombs. They were invented, and used quite successfully, during World War II. But these were radio controlled, and required skilled operators to succeed. Expensive as well, and no one wanted to spend the money to train effective operators in peacetime. In wartime, price was no object, and experience was easy to get.

Thus the U.S. dropped smart bombs from their arsenal after World War II, and didn’t revive them until the 1960s, when lasers (developed a decade earlier) were used to bounce their light off a target. A bomb was equipped with a seeker that could home on the reflected laser light, and a guidance kit (battery and motors to operate small wings) to hit the target without an operator. This was cheaper and more effective than the earlier smart bombs. The next big jump, in the 1990s, was the GPS guided bomb, which finally perfected the smart bomb. Thus this wonder weapon took four decades to become an overnight sensation.

Other examples are helicopters, which became iconic of the Vietnam War: first flown in 1904, used sparingly by both sides in World War II, but not in wide use until the 1950s.

While many of these systems are called “wonder weapons,” they aren’t. That’s because every new weapon quickly produces new tactics and combat techniques that reduce the improved capabilities of the new weapons. This is often ignored by historians. Self-preservation is a great motivator, and in the face of new weapons, the enemy will quickly find ways to diminish the wonder.

June 29, 2011

Canada’s Cormorant fleet to stay airborne thanks to former “Marine One” helicopters

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, Italy, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:29

The Cormorant is not quite the success story we hoped for when we bought the helicopters for our search and rescue operations. Part of the problem is that spare parts for the choppers are in very short supply. An unexpected source of spare parts just happened to come our way recently:

The helicopters sold to Canada are the so-called US101 version of the EH101 aircraft developed during the 1980s and 1990s in the UK and Italy by companies which are now grouped as AgustaWestland. The UK forces, after massive delays and cost overruns, eventually received two versions, both known as “Merlin” — a naval submarine-hunting variant and a cargo or troop-carrying one for the RAF. Both types finally reached frontline useability around 2004-2005, but their availability rates have been poor: perhaps due to the fact that the Merlin didn’t sell well worldwide and thus parts were at a premium.

However the Merlin did sell to the Bush administration, which was seeking to replace its ageing VH-3 Sea King presidential helicopters operated by the US Marines (the president’s chopper becomes “Marine One” when he is aboard, just as his airforce-operated plane becomes “Air Force One”). But the US101 project, managed by Lockheed on behalf of AgustaWestland, soon became mired in cost and time overruns every bit as bad as those which had hit the Royal Navy’s HM1.

The plan might well have been doomed from the outset, with requirements calling for 14 VIP seats, hardening against electromagnetic pulse, an executive washroom and communications equivalent to “a flying Oval Office” — a pretty big ask for an aircraft which can only lift four tonnes in its RAF cargo-carrying incarnation.

The US101 problems became bad enough that each new Marine One copter was projected to cost as much as an Air Force One jumbo jet, and the costs became an issue in the presidential election — with both Mr Obama and his opponent John McCain vying to issue the strongest condemnation of the aircraft. Obama in particular described it as “procurement amok”, and unsurprisingly it was axed as soon as he took office.

Now the Canadians, who also operate the EH101 under the name “Cormorant”, have snapped up the former presidential fleet of nine aircraft for $164m.

March 8, 2011

Helicopter footage of 9/11 just released

Filed under: History, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:21

The Guardian explains:

Previously unseen footage of the 9/11 attacks, filmed from a police helicopter hovering above the burning World Trade Centre, has emerged almost a decade after the terrorist atrocity.

The New York Police Department air and sea rescue helicopter was dispatched to the scene of the attack to see whether any survivors could be rescued from the rooftops.

[. . .]

The video is part of a cache of information about the attack handed over by city agencies to the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the federal agency that investigated the collapse.

It was released by NIST on 3 March under a Freedom of Information Act request, but it remains unclear who published the footage online.

February 2, 2011

UK government trying to further economize on helicopters for Afghan service

Filed under: Asia, Britain, Military — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:25

Lewis Page is concerned that, on top of the wrong-headed approach to cutting military costs, the coalition government may further reduce the Chinook helicopter plans:

In its last months in office, the previous Labour government announced plans to order 22 new Chinook helicopters (in addition to two which would replace recent combat losses in Afghanistan). The money was to be found by cutting squadrons of fast jets — in particular, Tornado low-level deep strike bombers. The first 10 helicopters were to come into service in 2012-13.

On arrival in office the Coalition carried out a Strategic Defence Review, personally supervised by Prime Minister Cameron, in which it was decided that the Tornado bomber fleet would be preserved intact, the Chinook order would be cut to just 12 — and, controversially, that the Harrier jumpjet fleet would be scrapped entirely.

Even the much reduced Chinook order has so far failed to actually be signed, and there have since been suggestions that the Ministry of Defence financial assumptions which underlay the Review were too optimistic – thus, that more cuts might be required.

October 28, 2010

It’s “like asking an alcoholic to run a distillery”

Filed under: Cancon, Economics, Military, Politics — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 13:26

The dissent on the announced purchase of F-35 fighter jets continues to gain traction:

In an interview on CBC’s Power and Politics last night, Industry Minister Tony Clement admitted we are buying the F-35s because the military wants them. “It is the best plane on the market. I will say on your program, I’m not the expert. The military are the experts. Why don’t the Liberals take the word of the Canadian military on that?” he asked.

Let me count the ways. A brief read of the A-G’s report on the purchase of military helicopters suggests a host of reasons why allowing the Department of National Defence to dictate procurement is like asking an alcoholic to run a distillery.

Sheila Fraser’s report concluded that National Defence knew, but did not tell the politicians, that the helicopter it wanted was not an “off-the-shelf “ model, with a relatively low risk of cost and time overruns.

In the event, the total cost for the 15 Chinook heavy lift helicopters more than doubled to $4.9-billion from the $2-billion price tag when the project was presented to the Conservative government and approved. Helicopters that were initially scheduled to be delivered last July, now won’t be ready until June 2013 — a state of affairs Ms. Fraser decried as “totally inappropriate”.

I’m not convinced that the F-35 is the aircraft Canada actually needs, and the DND’s track record on equipment purchases combined with the ultra-spendy pricetag on the F-35 make me concerned that they’re going to put themselves in the same state as the British armed forces by over-committing to kit that they (that is, we) can’t afford.

October 3, 2010

Pakistan’s self-harming border closure

Filed under: Asia, Economics, Military, Railways — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 11:22

Strategypage shows why Pakistan is doing itself more harm than good on the Afghan border:

After a recent incident where U.S. helicopter gunships crossed into Pakistan, in hot pursuit of Islamic terrorists, and killed three Pakistani soldiers (and a lot more terrorists), Pakistan cut one of the two NATO supply routes that pass through Pakistan. Aside from the fact that the Pakistani soldiers fired on the NATO helicopters (which they often do, even when the choppers are on the Afghan side of the border), the U.S. didn’t have to remind the Pakistanis that such a gesture was self-defeating. The Pakistani government is heavily dependent on American economic and military aid, and more and more of the supplies for foreign troops in Pakistan is coming from non-Pakistani sources. This hurts Pakistani businesses that move, and often provide, the supplies.

At the moment, about half those supplies come through Pakistan. The Pakistanis only closed, for about a day, one of the two main routes. About 30 percent of the supplies come in via Central Asia railroads, and another comes from the Black Sea, via rail to the Afghan border. The remaining 20 percent comes in by air. But some of that may be shifted to the Central Asian route, which is much safer (from bandits, bad roads and the Taliban) than the Pakistan routes.

Pakistan may have helped create conditions that will actually improve the economies of several other countries:

Shipping supplies to Afghanistan via Russian and Central Asian railroads has advantages for the nations it passes through. Russia has an economic interest in this, as more traffic makes it financially attractive for Central Asian nations to invest in upgrading their rail connections to Afghanistan. Tajikistan, for example, is extending its railroad to the Afghan border by building another 145 kilometers of track. Afghanistan itself has no railroads, mainly because there is not enough economic activity in the country to make this worthwhile. Foreign donors have contributed billions of dollars since 2002 to build more paved roads in Afghanistan. Currently, there are 42,000 kilometers of roads there, but only a third are paved. There are few rivers, much less navigable ones, and no access to the sea. The place has long been a logistical nightmare. Most Afghans recognize that roads will make the country more prosperous, by making it economically feasible to export many commodities, and cheaper to bring in, and distribute, foreign goods. Naturally, the Taliban are opposed to all this road building, as it threatens the poverty and ancient customs that Islamic conservatives are so fond of.

August 10, 2010

Free flight in Indian helicopter? No, thanks, I’ll walk.

Filed under: India, Military, Politics — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 07:51

Strategy Page would recommend that you think twice before climbing aboard an Indian helicopter:

The Indian Air Force is being criticized for mismanaging its fleet of over 300 helicopters. It gets worse when you realize that this is not enough helicopters for all of the needs of the Indian armed forces. But despite that, over ten percent of those helicopters are diverted to UN peacekeeping operations and for transporting VIPs (senior government officials). In addition, it’s been publicized that helicopters are often assigned to fly the wives of senior air force officials. That, and maintenance problems, mean that only about 60 percent of the helicopter fleet is available for military needs.

It gets worse. Despite needing a third more helicopters, the helicopters are dying of old age. As in 78 percent of current choppers have exceeded their design life. The aging equipment was no secret, but the navy only began obtaining new helicopters in the last three years (and for the five years before that obtained none.)

July 20, 2010

Cooling the (Navy’s) jets

Filed under: Military, Technology, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 07:57

The carrier variant of the F-35 fighter and the V-22 tilt-rotor helicopter both present an unexpected problem to carrier crews: the risk of melting the deck. The heat of the exhaust on both of these aircraft can cause damage to the carrier’s deck if they are left running for more than a short period of time. Strategy Page reports:

The navy sought a solution that would not require extensive modification of current carrier decks. This includes a lot of decks, both the eleven large carriers, and the ten smaller LHAs and LHDs. This began looking like another multi-billion dollar “oops” moment, as the melting deck problem was never brought up during the long development of either aircraft. Previously, the Harrier was the only aircraft to put serious amounts of heat on the carrier deck, but not enough to do damage. But when you compare the Harrier engine with those on the V-22 and F-35B, you can easily see that there is a lot more heat coming out of the two more recent aircraft. Someone should have done the math before it became a real problem.

The solution to the V-22 heat issue is pretty straightforward: put heat-resistant pads under the exhausts, but the F-35 requires a (hopefully minor) redesign of the exhaust nozzles to diffuse the heat.

June 2, 2010

Litany of problems with new NH-90 helicopters

Filed under: Australia, Europe, Germany, Military, Technology — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:25

Strategy Page reports that new NH-90 helicopters delivered to Australia are showing similar problems to the laundry list of issues the Germans reported when their NH-90s went into service:

The German Army conducted an evaluation of their new NH-90 helicopters, and were not pleased. Their conclusion was that, for combat missions, another model helicopter should be used whenever possible. A particular problem was the lack of ground clearance. The NH-90 can’t land on a piece of ground with any obstacles higher than 16 cm (6.4 inches). That makes many battlefield landing zones problematic. That assumes you can even get on a NH-90 and find a seat. The passenger seats cannot hold more than 110 kg (242 pounds). Combat equipment for German troops weighs 25 kg (55 pounds), meaning any soldier weighing more than 85 kg (187) has to take stuff off, put it on the floor, than quickly put it back on before exiting. Then there’s the floor, it’s not very sturdy, and combat troops using the helicopter for a short while, cause damage that takes the helicopter out of action for repairs. Worse, there is the rear ramp. It cannot support troops carrying all their equipment, making it useless for rapid exits of combat troops. There is not enough room in the passenger compartment for door gunners. There are no strap downs for larger weapons, like portable rocket launchers or anti-aircraft missiles. The passenger compartment also does not allow for carrying cargo and passengers at the same time. The winch is not sturdy enough for commandoes to perform fast roping operations. And so on. The Germans were not pleased with the NH-90.

I’ve never specced out a new helicopter design, but these complaints sound like issues that should have come up during the initial design review, not things that appear once you’ve taken delivery. It sounds like the military equivalent of buying a new car without taking a test drive or checking the specifications for how well the vehicle matched your actual requirements.

Design fail, manufacturing fail, or ordering fail?

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