US reconnaissance aircraft: description and photo

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

The Armed Forces of the United States of America are considered one of the most powerful and powerful military formations in the world. This statement is confirmed not only by a large number of soldiers and officers, but also by an impressive amount of various equipment, among which the US Air Force RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft occupies a special place. This aircraft has been in service for quite a long time, however, thanks to regular full-fledged modernization, to this day it is a fairly mobile and highly effective means of conducting reconnaissance operations. This aircraft will be discussed in this article.

A few facts

The described US reconnaissance aircraft is an air unit for collecting, carefully processing and then transmitting data to the main point. The combat unit is based on the technical characteristics of the Boeing C-135 Stratolifter aircraft. Equipment for the RC-135 is manufactured by various companies, including: L-3 Communications, E-Systems, General Dynamics.

Creation and modernization

The specified US reconnaissance aircraft was originally developed to replace the morally and physically obsolete Boeing RB-50 in the skysuperfortress. First of all, it was planned to produce nine cars, but in the end only four of them left the assembly line. All of them were an improved version of the Boeing 739-700, since the same engines were used. At the same time, the filling system was completely dismantled, and cameras used for reconnaissance and photography were installed in its place.

In turn, the RC-135B variant was made in the amount of ten cars. They were also based on an airtanker. Cameras and a special SLAR radar were used as "all-seeing eyes".

2005 was a significant year for the RC-135 aircraft, as all of them, without exception, underwent significant modernization (engines, navigation equipment and other elements and systems were completely replaced).

Operation

The US reconnaissance aircraft we are considering originally belonged to the US Air Force Strategic Command. But, starting in 1992, he was reassigned to the combat command of the Air Force. All such machines have a permanent base of their base - this is the Offut airbase.

Aircraft took an active part in military conflicts in various parts of our planet. The aircraft were used during the long war in Vietnam, during the special operations "Eldorado Canyon", "Desert Shield", "Desert Storm", "Unconquered Freedom".

River Joint

This is the code name for the US Air Force RC-135V reconnaissance aircraft. This ship was originallya rather marvelous appearance: the “puffed out cheeks” of the RTR system with an elongated nose, literally stuffed with AN / AMQ-15 communications intelligence equipment. Under the fuselage is located a number of antennas of various calibers. There were three whip antennas on the radar radome adapter. Lobe antennas with oval plates in the amount of four pieces were installed under the center section. Behind the wing there was a place for an L-shaped antenna and several more whip ones.

The birth of the RC-135W

In turn, the US Air Force RC-135W reconnaissance aircraft differed from its counterpart RC-135V in that it did not have heat exchanger air intakes on special engine nacelles located outside the engines. After a certain period of time, the “swollen cheeks” of the cars were somewhat modified in order to improve aerodynamic performance. The front parts of the fairings have also undergone changes - they have become somewhat longer, as a result of which the left fairing even slightly blocked the entrance hatch and the cover of the latter was eventually finalized.

In the 1990s, when the machines began their work in the military conflict zone of the now former Yugoslavia, engineers installed special installations above the nozzles of all existing engines that generate infrared interference. This was done in order to increase the degree of protection against anti-aircraft missiles equipped with a thermal homing head.

Team

The US RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft is operated by a fairly large team, inwhich includes:

- Air Combat Command officers.

- Three operators of electronic warfare (radar security): automatic reconnaissance, manual reconnaissance, shift supervisor. The task of this group is to track the location of enemy aircraft, as well as anti-aircraft missile systems by their radar emissions, which, in turn, are intercepted by the AEELS system.

- 12-16 operators who are part of the air intelligence department. Their combat mission is to use a multi-channel reconnaissance system in the ultrashort wave range to conduct radio surveillance of interceptions carried out by fighters, as well as communications of enemy air defense sectors. That is, in fact, these military personnel are working to reveal the intentions of the enemy.

- 7 technical operators controlling the most detailed supervision of all radar emissions of objects located in the air, on land, in the sea. In parallel, these specialists refine the results of automatic search and classification using manual exploration. After that, the military form official messages, signaling in detail about the electronic situation. All information received is passed on to analysts who are members of the aircraft's working group.

The leading analyst-controller is directly involved in the formation of a map of the radar situation, and two more analysts are subordinate to him: the first deals with ground targets, the second with air targets. In addition, they all control that all information transmitted from the aircraft to the center is updated every twominutes (at least), and in case of urgent need - once every ten seconds.

Separately, it is worth paying attention to two more operators who detect and register all non-standard or unidentified signals that were not previously used by the enemy. This is done in order to timely and fully update the electronic warfare system. The operators also monitor all enemy attempts to overcome the protection of the American aviation communications system.

In addition to the above specialists permanently stationed at their combat stations, there is also an operator involved in transmitting data to the E-3 AWACS aircraft and a couple of specialists performing flight maintenance.

Aircraft Bottleneck

The US reconnaissance aircraft has a significant problem in the form of limited communication between it and the E-3 AWACS aircraft. Data transmission is carried out via a digital channel in the TADIL-A format.

It is this channel that passes through itself absolutely all the symbolic-graphic images of the air horizon received by the radar method, formed by the operators of the E-3 vessel. After processing, the information is returned back, but in digital form. At the same time, it is supplemented by a variety of special markers for recognizing and differentiating all air targets without exception.

Performance

The reconnaissance aircraft of the US Air Force studied by us in detail has the following indicators as its main indicators:

• Wingspan -39.88 meters.
• Total aircraft length –39.2 meters.
• The height of the aircraft is 12.7 meters;
• The area of each wing is 226.03 square meters.
• The weight of the empty aircraft is 46403 kg.
• Maximum takeoff weight - 124967 kg.
• Engine modification - Pratt Whitney TF33-P-9 turbofan.
• Thrust – 4 x 80.07 kN.
• The airspeed limit is 991 km/h.
• Cruising speed - 901 km/h.
• Practical flight range - 9100 km.
• Machine range – 4308
• Max flight altitude - 12375 meters.

Incident over the Black Sea

January 25, 2016 US reconnaissance aircraft approached the border of the Russian Federation. As a result, the Su-27 aircraft was raised into the sky, which intercepted the American aircraft. According to the official representative of the US Navy European Command, Captain Daniel Hernandez, the interception of their reconnaissance aircraft was carried out in an extremely unsafe and unprofessional manner, which cannot but worry the American leadership, because this incident only aggravates an already tense situation. The American officer also claimed that the RC-135U Combat was performing a scheduled flight in international space over the Black Sea, without violating anyone's state borders. Representatives of Russia, in turn, noticed that the American plane was in the sky with the transponder turned off.

According to information received from The Washington Free Beacon, a Russian fighter flew toAmerican aircraft at a distance of six meters, after which for some period of time it flew side by side. Then the Russian pilot maneuvered and abruptly swerved to the side. As a result, the jet stream from the Su-27 literally pushed the US air reconnaissance aircraft, which caused it to lose control.

Duel over the B altic

April 14, 2016, once again, a US reconnaissance aircraft flew up to the borders of Russia. It is quite logical that this situation did not go unnoticed by the Air Force of the Russian Federation. The command of the Russians decided to stop the attempt to violate the state border, for which a jet fighter was raised into the air. As a result, the Su-27 was intercepted by a US reconnaissance aircraft. This maneuver, according to American military leaders, was again carried out in a daring manner and endangered the crew of the American aircraft.

In addition, the US Army command expressed "deepest concern", which was caused by the "unprofessional and unsafe actions of the Russian pilot."

Japan conflict

On May 22, 2016, the Russian air defense system detected an American RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft over the Sea of Japan. At that moment, he was performing reconnaissance in the immediate vicinity of the Russian border. It is noteworthy that the US aircraft was in the sky with the transponder turned off and did not communicate information about the route to the controllers of the region, which contributed to the risk of collisions between civilian aircraft. In addition, the American aircraftwas located precisely at those echelons where flights of regular civil aviation flights were carried out. of course, the Su-27 intercepted the US reconnaissance aircraft.

In order to explain what happened, the military attache at the US Embassy was summoned to the Russian Ministry of Defense for a conversation. Russian leaders drew the attention of their American colleague to preventing similar situations in the future and taking appropriate measures to guarantee the safety of aircraft in the sky.

Somewhat later it became known that the reconnaissance aircraft was visually detected by the crew of a Swiss long-haul passenger aircraft. According to the pilots, they saw a heavy four-engine aircraft that did not show any identification marks.

Confrontation with the Chinese

Once again, the interception of a US reconnaissance aircraft took place in May 2016 over international waters in the South China Sea. As the Americans specified, this incident took place in international airspace. According to the Pentagon, Chinese Air Force fighter jets intercepted a US spy plane unsafely. Such a statement by the Americans no longer surprised anyone, since such a formulation is standard in every such situation. The American officer also noted that the reconnaissance aircraft was performing "normal routine patrols."

Causes of the conflict with China

This incident was triggered by rapidly rising tensions in this region of the South China Sea. Everything is explainedincreased activity of China in terms of the construction of artificial islands. At the same time, the states that are neighbors of the Celestial Empire, including the United States, are extremely concerned about the current situation, since they believe that China will in the future deploy a missile defense system on these man-made islands. Largely because of this, the United States, under the pretext of ensuring an adequate level of security for international shipping, sent its navy to the problematic region, which quite logically caused a flurry of discontent on the part of the PRC leadership.

Such close attention to the seemingly unremarkable area of the sea surface is explained by the fact that the South China Sea is a bone of contention between China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Brunei, the Philippines and Malaysia. And all because in this part of the world there are significant deposits of various natural resources: gas, oil, etc.