Spaceplane Carrier Landings?

[Javster]

It's SOP for a carrier to go full speed into the wind when conducting flight ops. Modern carriers have a top speed around 35kts or about 65km/h (the overpowered Enterprise was capable of 45+ kts (over 80km/h) but it is sadly retired). With a good headwind this can reduce stall speed relative to the carrier by more than 100km/h.

Wow, they already do all they can to make landings easier? That will make it even harder to land a spaceplane on the carrier...

[Sean Mirrsen]

Well, I suppose if you stretch the definition of "carrier" and make an ekranoplan runway barge that can match the shuttle's landing velocity on water...

[cantab]

Hmmm...yet another idea occurs. The OP never said we had to use just one carrier.

Take the ten Nimitz-class carriers to the stillest waters you can get them to, put them nose-to-tail, bridge over the gaps, and you have a ten-thousand foot runway for the Shuttle/Buran/Dream Chaser/Skylon/whatever to land on.

[linkxsc]

Well the Ford class carrier... no solid info has come out about its top speed but it'd probably be capable of the upper 40kts. Assuming 45, thats 51mph or 81kph. (a full 15mph faster than the stall speed on my fathers supercub, and faster than the stall speed on that "flying flapjack" plane by chance vought) Into a headwind which on the sea, finding a 20-30mph wind is certainly easy enough. Shuttle landed on a regular runway at 215mph, so its relative speed to a carrier could actually be about 135. We could probably manage a spaceplane design that's a bit more aerodynamic and could land at that kind of relative speed.

At the same time I really don't know about that upper 40kts. The power plant is gonna be making quite a bit more than previous ships, and the hull profile is a bit better designed. Entirely possible that if they cranked up to flank speed they might break into the 50kt range

[Red Iron Crown]

Well the Ford class carrier... no solid info has come out about its top speed but it'd probably be capable of the upper 40kts. Assuming 45, thats 51mph or 81kph. (a full 15mph faster than the stall speed on my fathers supercub, and faster than the stall speed on that "flying flapjack" plane by chance vought) Into a headwind which on the sea, finding a 20-30mph wind is certainly easy enough. Shuttle landed on a regular runway at 215mph, so its relative speed to a carrier could actually be about 135. We could probably manage a spaceplane design that's a bit more aerodynamic and could land at that kind of relative speed.

At the same time I really don't know about that upper 40kts. The power plant is gonna be making quite a bit more than previous ships, and the hull profile is a bit better designed. Entirely possible that if they cranked up to flank speed they might break into the 50kt range

I wasn't aware that higher speed was a part of the plan for the Ford class. It was my understanding that she was to have upgraded power generation but similar propulsion capabilities but I could be wrong.

The Enterprise was a bit of a special case as an admiral (Rickover maybe?) insisted that conventional boilers be replaced by reactors on a one-for-one basis, for eight(!) total. This resulted in a ship that could not use the full power of her propulsion system due to structural limitations. The Nimitz got rid of all the extra reactors to free up internal space, so she and subsequent carriers have only two.

[Nicholander]

Let's say it's the USS Enterprise, the longest aircraft carrier in the world, at 341 meters in length. In comparison, the Shuttle Landing Facility at the real KSC is 4,572 meters long, a little over 4.5 kilometers. So yeah, you have to shave off 4.2 kilometers of landing distance, and would the USS Enterprise structurally be capable of supporting a Shuttle landing? (Like would the "Runway" of it collapse when the landing gear touched down onto it?) Could you add more parachutes, put some little SRBs on it, and perhaps try to purposely stall the shuttle to try and get the landing distance down, would that make it able to do so?

Edited October 11, 2014 by Nicholander

[Javster]

Wasn't there a post like this?

[General Rarity]

You can land a unmodified shuttle on an aircraft carrier, it will just result in half the carrier being destoyed and losing a shuttle.

In all seriousness, though, there was a thread about this and I'll look into it when I find it.

[Master Tao]

The Space Shuttle touched down at up to 100 m/s. It was also 37 m long, so if we assume perfect piloting there's about 260 m of stopping distance. All the shuttle has to do is apply 100 m/s of atmospheric delta-v in time to stop:

• d = (v_initial + v_final)/2t
  
• t = 2d/(v_initial + v_final) = 2 * 260 m / (100 m/s + 0 m/s) = 5.2 s
  
• a = (v_initial + v_final)/t = 100 m/s / 5.2 s = 19.2 m/s²
  

Even if the deceleration were variable, that should still be survivable. Now you just have to find SRBs that can apply 2 gees to a 70 ton flying brick for 5.2s without significantly altering it's flight characteristics. I'll leave that as an exercise to the reader.

And, yes, there's a similar thread, but that one asked for a solution involving no engines.

[montyben101]

So no basically, the shuttle wouldn't really need to do so anyway. It had 2 runways to choose from on different sides of America.

Also I agree the shuttle was expensive but do you really need to say you hate it as a disclaimer? Just annoys me when people say they hate it whenever a discussion about it comes up

[Mr Shifty]

The Space Shuttle touched down at up to 100 m/s. It was also 37 m long, so if we assume perfect piloting there's about 260 m of stopping distance. All the shuttle has to do is apply 100 m/s of atmospheric delta-v in time to stop:

Aircraft that land on a carrier do not use their brakes to stop; they're stopped by an arresting cable. (Also note that that aircraft do not have the full length of the deck to land; they must land on the angled landing strip, which is about 250 meters from deck edge to deck edge.) In fact, they go to full throttle as soon as their wheels touch down so that if they miss the wire they won't subsequently fall into the ocean. The heaviest aircraft that has landed on modern aircraft carriers is probably the F-14, which weighs in at about 20 metric tons. The C-2 is probably the widest wingspan aircraft at about 25 meters. Modern aircraft carrier arresting gears are rated to stop a 23 metric ton aircraft travelling 130 knots. The Space Shuttle orbiter weighed about 69 metric tons (empty weight), had a wingspan slightly smaller than the C-2, and landed at about 190 knots. Aircraft carrier arresting gear would almost certainly 'fail' (a euphemism for catastrophic failure leading to much death and injury.) Flight decks are armored to withstand the explosive yield of 1000 pound bombs, so it's quite possible that the deck itself would take little damage the impact of the orbiter, but the orbiter would almost certainly end up in the drink.

Edited October 11, 2014 by Mr Shifty

[Javster]

If you could modify the Space Shuttle, couldn't you modify the carrier much more easily?

[Frannington]

The heaviest aircraft that has landed on modern aircraft carriers is probably the F-14, which weighs in at about 20 metric tons. The C-2 is probably the widest wingspan aircraft at about 25 meters. Modern aircraft carrier arresting gears are rated to stop a 23 metric ton aircraft travelling 130 knots. The Space Shuttle orbiter weighed about 69 metric tons (empty weight), had a wingspan slightly smaller than the C-2, and landed at about 190 knots. Aircraft carrier arresting gear would almost certainly 'fail' (a euphemism for catastrophic failure leading to much death and injury.) Flight decks are armored to withstand the explosive yield of 1000 pound bombs, so it's quite possible that the deck itself would take little damage the impact of the orbiter, but the orbiter would almost certainly end up in the drink.

I don't disagree with your conclusions at all, but just wanted to point out that the heaviest (and widest) aircraft ever to land on an aircraft carrier was a C-130F (wingspan 132 feet, empty weight 34.4 metric tons. According to that link, they tested it up to about 55 metric tons).

Edited October 11, 2014 by Frannington

[meve12]

Now you just have to find SRBs that can apply 2 gees to a 70 ton flying brick for 5.2s without significantly altering it's flight characteristics. I'll leave that as an exercise to the reader.

It'd probably look like this:

Those rockets lie flush inside the hull when cruising, and rotate out when in use, so they won't effect aerodynamics that much. Weight distribution might be harder.

Of course, the hardest question of all might be why you want to land the shuttle on a carrier.

[kujuman]

It's important to remember that CVs can steam pretty fast and travel into the wind. So a nice hurricane and a CV at flank and you might be able to land at 20 m/s relative speed.

[Nicholander]

The Space Shuttle touched down at up to 100 m/s. It was also 37 m long, so if we assume perfect piloting there's about 260 m of stopping distance.

260 M of stopping distance? Then why on Earth was the Shuttle Landing Facility 4.5 kilometers long?

[kurja]

260 M of stopping distance? Then why on Earth was the Shuttle Landing Facility 4.5 kilometers long?

...because the shuttle couldn't come to a halt in 260 meters?

[Nicholander]

Then why did he say it could stop in 260 m? I know he's wrong, but why did he say that?

[meve12]

260 M of stopping distance? Then why on Earth was the Shuttle Landing Facility 4.5 kilometers long?

I suspect that's the runway space available to stop in, not what the shuttle needs.

[cantab]

Yeah, we did kind of have this before.

But if you allow a modified shuttle, give it a VTOL (well, just VL actually) engine and sorted. Transitioning from forward flight might be hairy mind you.

[magnemoe]

It'd probably look like this:

Those rockets lie flush inside the hull when cruising, and rotate out when in use, so they won't effect aerodynamics that much. Weight distribution might be harder.

Of course, the hardest question of all might be why you want to land the shuttle on a carrier.

Probably not, I think they used some sort of net to catch it.

But yes the C130 is designed for landing slow on rough landing fields, design philosophy is kind of opposite of the shuttle.

The SRB version in the video was a plan to land them and tale off on a soccer field inside Iran.

The sort of missions who is to crazy to be used in an action movie.

[meve12]

Probably not, I think they used some sort of net to catch it.

But yes the C130 is designed for landing slow on rough landing fields, design philosophy is kind of opposite of the shuttle.

The SRB version in the video was a plan to land them and tale off on a soccer field inside Iran.

The sort of missions who is to crazy to be used in an action movie.

And it would have worked too if it weren't for that one test pilot. Curses!

We could apply the same idea to the shuttle; maybe modify some of the heat-shield panels to blow off on command, then stick SRBs 'under' them. Then come in on a really steep dive, and fire the SRBs as the shuttle flares out to cancel out vertical momentum. If done right, the shuttle hits the deck at a survivable speed (both in the vertical and the horizontal axis) as the SRBs start to burn out.

[Capt. Hunt]

actually, the C-130 used in the tests did a no-hook landing (and subsequent no-catapult takeoff), both without rockets, but C-130s are specifically designed for STOL. Also, attaching retro-rockets to the shuttle would not be as easy as in KSP, you'd probably have to re-engineer the entire spaceframe to take the stresses of the retrofire, not to mention that adding volatile rocket fuel meant to be used after reentry is ill-advised. There's a reason the shuttle vents any unspent propellant prior to reentry.

[kujuman]

The shuttle carried the force of the liquid engines through it to the attachment points on the ET. So presumably if you added the retro rockets at the attachment points (I'm thinking the nose one) then you're creating a similar compression as when the LFEs were firing, though to what magnitude is a different question.

[Kerbart]

It's important to remember that CVs can steam pretty fast and travel into the wind. So a nice hurricane and a CV at flank and you might be able to land at 20 m/s relative speed.

I'm going to be a bit pessimistic about your naval experience.

Yes, a flattop can sail pretty fast, probably somewhere in the range of 30 knots. That's 55kmh or 34mph for you landlubbers and when you think about that, it's an amazing speed for such a large mass of floating steel.

It's also about 15 m/s which means is does basically nothing to reduce the relative landing speed of the shuttle.

But... you mentioned using a hurricane for headwind. First of all, to get an idea, typhoon Vongfong which is hitting Japan right now was pretty heavy for a hurricane. At it's peak sustained windspeed of over 180 mph. That's about 80 m/s so that would help. Now... do you think a carrier captain would be willing to steer into a storm like that? And do you think anybody who is sane enough to pass the qualifications as a shuttle pilot would even entertain the thought of landing at a carrier deck in weather like that? With any aircraft? We're talking about 50' waves here, and the vessel probably listing from 30° port to 30° starboard... Good luck!