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Do military aircraft utilize transponder signal based
collision avoidance systems? At 15:18 02 February 2004, Kirk Stant wrote: (Terry Claussen) wrote in message news:... A lousy end to what was a beautiful day of soaring, thanks to the USMC and my own lack of vigilance. Some thoughts on this incident (and comments in subsequent posts): If I hear a powerplane (any kind!) while cruising and don't see him - My response is to IMMEDIATELY throw up a wing and pull a hard S-turn. This does two things: It lets you check behind, where your greatest threat is, and throws a much bigger visual target for the approaching plane to see. And he is close enough to hear, he will probably see you. This works very well for military jets, not so well for airliners and bugsmashers, from personal experience. At the altitudes we usually fly, fighters will usually be transiting at relatively low speed (about 300 knots, perhaps 350). Down low (or high), they will be going a lot faster (450 - 600 knots) but if you are that low you are about to landout! But even at 350 knots, you have time to hear and react to the sound of the approaching fighters (this from personal experience). Note I say 'fighters' - there will almost always be at least two of them, maybe more, so do not stop searching after finding one figher - it's the wingman, not the flight lead, that is most likely to hit you (because his attention is divided between maintaining formation and clearing his flightpath). In the US most fighters will be either in relatively close formation (easy to see both) or spread out 1 to 2 miles line abreast (hard to see both). And it probably isn't the one that is closest to hitting you that you are going to pick up first, since he will be closest to nose-on. The good news is that if either figher sees you, he will warn the other to avoid you. Fighter pilots look out the window a lot, it is actually something they train at all the time. Don't count on that from airline or lightplane pilots, though! Airliners descending to land are a problem, since you absolutely cannot hear them - you have to pick them up (since they will probably not maneuver unless they get really exited!). Of course, they are big and brightly painted, so are a bit easier to see. When cruising, obviously it is most dangerous at the VFR hemispheric altitudes, but at least you should have an idea where the threat is coming from. Finally, in the US our transition altitude is 18000ft, and since most of us use the field elevation to set the altimeter (instead of calling FSS), there is going to be some altimeter discrepancies - so you really can't count on using altitude for close deconfliction. Kirk |
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