Spaceplane Carrier Landings?

[Sauron]

Obviously, this is a terrible idea with no serious real world applications. Objectively terrible.

Putting that bit aside, suppose a deranged maniac held a gun to the world's collective head and demanded that somebody stick a carrier landing with a space shuttle orbiter (or something of a similar size and similar aerodynamic characteristics)...

A few ground rules:

-Modest modifications to the orbiter are okay (I assume reinforced landing gear, strengthened airframe, and an arrestor hook are all non-negotiable). Major changes to aerodynamics or any type of propulsion are forbidden.

-Larger modifications to the carrier are okay (strengthened flight deck, a bespoke arrestor system, etc.).

So how would you do this?

[sharpspoonful]

Well, considering that you wouldn't be coming in much faster than a fighter jet landing on a carrier, why try to reinvent the wheel? Arrestor cables and landing hook, reinforced airframe and landing gear would probably do the trick. Oh, and some atmospheric engines for a possible touch and go if needed. You'd have to be one hell of a pilot to accomplish a carrier landing with a glider.

[Tex_NL]

The space shuttle weighs three times as much and lands 50% faster than a typical fighter jet.

Landing a fighter jet on a carrier is already considered a controlled crash landing. Even with serious modifications on both ends this would be all but impossible. So how would you do this? You don't.

[GoSlash27]

Speaking as someone who has a whole lot of stick time in FSX shooting carrier approaches (some of them engines-out), I would personally avoid it if at all possible

The carrier approach uses throttles to maintain glideslope, and a shuttle has no throttles on landing. Plus no ability to go around in the event of a "bolter".

You can make a successful dead-stick approach to a carrier, but you don't want to have to. But if you *have* to...

Take a "charlie" on arrival. Keep your approach high and clean until you actually see the ball, then dirty up for landing at about 3/4 NM. You will want to maintain a steep glideslope and red/ fast AoA until 1/4 NM. Find your glideslope there and hope that your AoA doesn't go too slow before you hit the ramp.

And be prepared to eject, because things can still easily go wrong even if everything goes "right".

Been there done that,

-Slashy

[magnemoe]

Speaking as someone who has a whole lot of stick time in FSX shooting carrier approaches (some of them engines-out), I would personally avoid it if at all possible

The carrier approach uses throttles to maintain glideslope, and a shuttle has no throttles on landing. Plus no ability to go around in the event of a "bolter".

You can make a successful dead-stick approach to a carrier, but you don't want to have to. But if you *have* to...

Take a "charlie" on arrival. Keep your approach high and clean until you actually see the ball, then dirty up for landing at about 3/4 NM. You will want to maintain a steep glideslope and red/ fast AoA until 1/4 NM. Find your glideslope there and hope that your AoA doesn't go too slow before you hit the ramp.

And be prepared to eject, because things can still easily go wrong even if everything goes "right".

Been there done that,

-Slashy

As I read you throttle up during carrier landings, this is so you can take off again if you miss, if you grab the engine running is a minor issue.

An unpowered landing on carrier, forget it, what if you come in too low? It might have worked during WW2 but not today

[GoSlash27]

^ Reviewing my FSX logbook, I have exactly 3,458 hours, all of it carrier ops. In all that time I have only had the opportunity to shoot 3 dead stick carrier approaches. 2 were successful (1 in an F-35 and 1 in an F-14D) and 1 was not (RA-5C Vigilante).

IRL, NATOPS excludes dead stick carrier approaches as illegal and the Superbug loses all control authority with engines out, so it's just plain not possible.

[GoSlash27]

As I read you throttle up during carrier landings, this is so you can take off again if you miss, if you grab the engine running is a minor issue.

An unpowered landing on carrier, forget it, what if you come in too low? It might have worked during WW2 but not today

That's an important part of it, but it's not all. The glideslope is a fixed angle coming up from the #3 wire, which the pilot can see from the fresnel lens. Adjusting to stay on glideslope requires a throttle input, while staying "on speed" according to the AoA indexer requires a pitch correction. Keeping the lineup is a bank and heading thing, which is trickier than it sounds, since the runway is always drifting out to the right from under you.

Point is, without throttles, you can't maintain an on speed/ on glideslope indication. You will eventually end up slow and low without the ability to go around. This means a ramp strike, which is very bad news.

-Slashy

[No one]

-Larger modifications to the carrier are okay (strengthened flight deck, a bespoke arrestor system, etc.).

Are modifications which make the carrier larger ok?

Make the carrier so massive that the difficulties of landing on it disappear. (I assume that they would if you made it large enough. Is there a difficulty other than that the carrier is moving? If you made it large enough then the motion wouldn't really matter because if you aimed for the middle of the carrier then by the time you arrived it might have moved a bit but you would still be on the carrier. I think.)

[GoSlash27]

Are modifications which make the carrier larger ok?

Make the carrier so massive that the difficulties of landing on it disappear. (I assume that they would if you made it large enough. Is there a difficulty other than that the carrier is moving? If you made it large enough then the motion wouldn't really matter because if you aimed for the middle of the carrier then by the time you arrived it might have moved a bit but you would still be on the carrier. I think.)

The difficulty isn't in the size of the carrier. The difficulty is in contacting the carrier with just the right AoA, airspeed, and lineup. If any of those are out of limits, your "controlled crash" becomes a plain old "crash". Too much sink rate and your landing gear collapses. Too much AoA and you destroy the airframe, rupturing the fuel cells. Too much airspeed and you snap the wire. Too far off center and you flip the plane.

Carrier landings are *dangerous*! The way they mitigate the hazard is by shooting the approach in the middle of the "safe" zone. You can't do that with no engines. You are forced to approach the carrier outside of the safe envelope and hope that you are within the safe parameters when you hit the deck.

I'd recommend getting some time actually doing carrier ops to see what I'm talking about.

www.fsxcarrierops.com

I'm "K6952" over there.

-Slashy

[colmo]

The Buran landed within feet of its target on its one, unmanned flight.

No one said it had to be a manned vessel, right?

[No one]

The difficulty isn't in the size of the carrier. The difficulty is in contacting the carrier with just the right AoA, airspeed, and lineup. If any of those are out of limits, your "controlled crash" becomes a plain old "crash". Too much sink rate and your landing gear collapses. Too much AoA and you destroy the airframe, rupturing the fuel cells. Too much airspeed and you snap the wire. Too far off center and you flip the plane.

Carrier landings are *dangerous*! The way they mitigate the hazard is by shooting the approach in the middle of the "safe" zone. You can't do that with no engines. You are forced to approach the carrier outside of the safe envelope and hope that you are within the safe parameters when you hit the deck.

I'd recommend getting some time actually doing carrier ops to see what I'm talking about.

www.fsxcarrierops.com

I'm "K6952" over there.

-Slashy

My mistake, I thought the problem was that the carrier was small and (more importantly) moving.

If you had a large enough carrier, couldn't you slow it down without a wire though?

[Nuke]

you need a couple nuclear reactors, but thats ok, carriers have those. then you need a laser, carriers probibly have these too. then you need an atmospheric laser thermal engine that is small enough to cram into a space shuttle and powerful enough to allow it to maintain altitude. ??? profit.

[Scotius]

If relatively minor modifications are not allowed, then building bigger carrier is not an option too. Besides, it would take years

[General Rarity]

, then building bigger carrier is not an option too. Besides, it would take years

But it'd be cool...

[No one]

If relatively minor modifications are not allowed, then building bigger carrier is not an option too. Besides, it would take years

The OP said:

-Larger modifications to the carrier are okay

I simply want to modify the carrier to make it larger. I don't know if this would count as one of the accepted "larger" modifications or if it would be too major. Also, I think the issue is what you're modifying. The OP said that only modest modifications to the orbiter were OK while larger modifications to the carrier were OK.

[Nao]

If i had to go "Kerbal" on the concept... I would set up an aerial refueling of the OMS during the 2minute window of descent with a specially fitted KC-135 to supply hypergolic fuel (lol ). And having a shallower and more controlled descent with the use of rocket engines. (actually the refueling could be set up in a way so that the shuttle would be towed during it to have more time for fuel transfer)

Another thing that comes to mind is the operation Credible Sport, where a C-130 was fitted with short burn rockets to rapidly slow down. It's a proven concept (within kerbal safety marigins) even thou the mission itself was scrapped, and empty SS is only like twice the weight of C-130 so it's not that much different (lol2). So in short, MOAR BOOSTERS could do the trick!

[KerbMav]

The orbiter has to hit the runway without an engine to throttle too - so I do not see any difference.

The carrier might have to be equipped with more cables to grab onto, basically all along the flight deck, but else ... ?

[Stargate525]

Well, no one said that the carrier had to be able to land OTHER planes, or the shuttle able to land anywhere ELSE, or be re-useable...

Would it be possible to alter the carrier and/or the shuttle to allow a more intense impact? Replace the landing gear on the shuttle with skids bolted into the frame? Since we don't need to take off again, would replacing the flight deck with some sort of sand or other more giving material help slow and cushion it?

This is coming from someone with 0 hours on any real simulator more complex than Warthunder's arcade mode, so this might be entirely unworkable.

[RocketscientistV]

Aircraft carriers are already equipped with an net to land planes without carrier modifications. If you want to land a carrier this is what you want to modify.

[Frozen_Heart]

Take the main engines out of the orbiter and put them on the launcher. Just have OMS on the orbiter. This would save a lot of weight and make the glideslope and landing speed easier to deal with.

[Tex_NL]

Take the main engines out of the orbiter and put them on the launcher. Just have OMS on the orbiter. This would save a lot of weight and make the glideslope and landing speed easier to deal with.

If this was an option don't you think NASA would have designed it that way?

[R0cketC0der]

If this was an option don't you think NASA would have designed it that way?

They didn't do it because they did recover the engines. However Buran proved that the main engines don't have to be on the orbiter for shuttles.

[Frozen_Heart]

If this was an option don't you think NASA would have designed it that way?

Buran

10 chars

[andrewas]

My mistake, I thought the problem was that the carrier was small and (more importantly) moving.

Doesn't matter how big the carrier is, you still have to hit the arrestor. Buran demonstrated the needed precision but I don't know if a carriers motions are predictable enough. Maybe given perfect weather conditions.

If you had a large enough carrier, couldn't you slow it down without a wire though?

You'd need an 8000' flight deck, the largest current carriers have a 1092' flight deck. But if you did have a carrier that big - which the military isn't interested in, because a fighter doesn't need that length of runway under any conditions - you could land a shuttle on it so long as you can touch down very close to the start of the runway. The longer the flight deck the more margin for error you have.

[Rickenbacker]

The Buran landed within feet of its target on its one, unmanned flight.

No one said it had to be a manned vessel, right?

The Burans target wasn't moving, though .

If you could strengthen a shuttle enough to take the force of a carrier landing, and add a hook to it (without compromising the head shield), I think the main thing you need is more and/or bigger spoilers, so you can control your glide slope. I wouldn't want to do it, though, as you'd only get one shot...