John Cook wrote:

On Tue, 15 Jun 2004 11:44:42 +0900, "Ragnar"
wrote:

Admittedly, you are no expert. Neither am I, but the question I have is:

How often is the gun used to strafe ground targets in the first place? If
the gun isn't used much, there isn't much point to wasting the space/weight,
is there?

In that case, how many rounds do YOU think the F-35 should carry -- 250, 500,
1,000, 10,000? What other equipment are you willing to do without, since
space/weight will always be limited? Have you factored into your calculations
that the F-35's FCS is likely to be far more accurate than the previous
generation, meaning that fewer rounds are needed to hit and kill a target? Will
the GAU-12 have selectable rates of fire, and burst limiters? Autofire
capability? Here's your chance to show us your skills as an analyst.

The same sort of reasoning was applied to the lifeboats on the
Titanic......

Well, no, the reasoning was rather different in that case, having to do with the
feeling that making the ship itself safer was more important than the lifeboats,
and the lifeboats would be used to transfer passengers to a rescue ship rather
than needing to carry the entire complement at once. Also, there was the thought
that in many sea conditions where ships would likely be in trouble it would be
impossible to launch the lifeboats or keep them from swamping. This in fact
happened about a year after the Titanic, when a passenger ship, the Volturno
IIRR, caught on fire in bad weather on the North Atlantic run. Rescue ships
reached her, but the first few attempts to launch lifeboats resulted in them
being lost with all aboard in the heavy seas. They were later able to get a few
away safely, but had to wait until a US navy ship showed up (an oiler IIRR) and
could lay down a slick to calm the seas, to allow the lifeboats to be launched
and row back and forth. Fortunately the fire was kept away from the remaining
passengers and crew until that could be done, but it was a near thing. See

homepages.rootsweb.com/~daamen1/volturno/story.htm

So, post-Titanic everyone agreed that there had to be sufficient lifeboats for
everyone on board, but that doesn't guarantee your safety. Depending on how the
ship is damaged and how quickly it sinks, you may not be able to use the
lifeboats on one side or the other, even if the sea conditions allow it. Both
the Lusitania and Andrea Doria took on such big lists in a short time that the
lifeboats on the high side of the ship couldn't be launched (wouldn't clear the
side of the ship), cutting the total available in half. Do we then require that
every passenger ship have sufficient lifeboats _on each side_ to accommodate
everyone on board? But that's no guarantee of success either; the Lusitania sank
so fast (ca. 18 minutes) that she still had way on, and several of the starboard
lifeboats were lost while launching owing to that. And being steeply down by the
bow or stern may also prevent boats from being launched, so do we now require
sufficient boats fore and aft, on each side, so that any one quadrant will have
sufficient capacity for everyone on board even if the other three quadrants'
boats are unusable? This also provides redundancy in the event of fire, which
seems to be the main threat to cruise and passenger ships.

What does this ship look like? Can anyone make money with it? Will anyone want
to travel on it? After all, any view of the surroundings is blocked by the boats
stacked four or five high and six across from prow to counter. There have been
improvements in lifeboats and launching methods in the last 90+ years, but not
enough to meet all of those requirements. The best idea is still to make the
ship itself sufficiently safe so that rescue ships (and aircraft) have time to
arrive.

Guy