The secret origins of America's STEALTH Black Hawks
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- čas přidán 15. 06. 2024
- The world got its first glimpse of America's stealth Black Hawk helicopters after the remnants of a tail section were left behind by Navy SEALs following the Bin Laden raid in 2011... but the history of these exotic and highly classified rotorcraft date back much further than that.
In fact, the secret origins of America's stealth Black Hawks even predate the F-117 Nighthawk entering service...
Here's PART 1 of our dive into these highly classified stealth helicopters.
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Citations:
- nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSA...
- verticalmag.com/features/hide...
- www.popsci.com/story/technolo...
- theaviationgeekclub.com/did-y...
- patents.google.com/patent/US2...
- tacairnet.com/2016/05/02/nept...
- theaviationist.com/2011/05/17...
- apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltex...
- www.key.aero/article/have-gla...
- www.globalsecurity.org/milita...
- us.macmillan.com/books/978146...
- www.nellis.af.mil/News/Articl...
- www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone...
- www.militarytoday.com/helicop...
- www.politico.com/news/magazin...
- aerocorner.com/aircraft/sikor...
In 2007 while serving on an Aircraft Carrier, there were 2 helicopters that looked like the Comanche but with a tail section like those seen in the crash recovery photos. They landed at night and access was highly restricted to the exterior of the ship. I was part of the security detail that secured access the the hanger bay where these aircraft were being kept. We were given strict instructions not to turn toward the hanger hatches when authorized personnel entered or existed the hanger.
Spooky AF...thanks for sharing SHELLBACK.
So I guess you did look then? Lol
@@crazywyvern4704 just when it was on the flight deck. The hanger bay instructions came later.
thanks for the state secrets
How are you suppose to guard something you can't look at
That feeling you mentioned having when you saw the rotor. I had it too.
I worked a little on Comanche. Mostly declassing and printing materials for presentation on The Hill.
I had it again when you mentioned Have Glass ... which I did not know was something we could talk about.
A google later and I see that apparently the entire planet knows, but for a bit I'm pretty sure my eyes bugged out of their sockets.
Thank for the excitement I guess.
Good work telling a neat story.
Have glass? What does that even mean
@@harryparsons2750
Please pay attention to the video starting at 19:54 to 22:45, Mr. Hollings discusses it in more detail than I am willing to.
"Have Glass" is the codeword for the program to reduce detectability of the F-16. (Compare to Have Blue, the codeword for F-117)
There are 5 publicly disclosed versions, and Have Glass 5 is in use by NATO partner nations.
Mr. Hollings mentions average radar cross section reduction of 76% for Have Glass 5, and that this is roughly equivalent to western estimates for the average RCS of the SU-57.
@@unknownuser069That stealth coatings began as cockpit window tint coatings was new to me. A pity they cannot vapor deposit the whole aircraft rather than paint it. This would save a hundred pounds and might produce better results. I did hear that coatings for aviation sunglasses and low-E coatings for home windows came out of commercial applications for former military tech.
LK-99 possible super conductor seems to only work when vapor deposited one molecule thick. ( hence all the labs making crystals found no results). But if a room temperature super conductor could be vapor deposited over an entire aircraft, it might have the ability to absorb large amounts of energy. Thus sucking up any incoming radar.
I was the same, Alex. The moment I saw it I turned to the USN Commander loaned to the Australian Navy Combat System Group I was working at and said "something's up with that chopper, it's not a Black Hawk, Sea Stallion or Chinook." I even showed him a picture of the Comanche.
Been waiting 12 years for this video to drop. Ever since the raid I've been dying to know the whole story!
Same here. 😎🇺🇸
I was just going to post how I've been waiting all week for this to drop but, a dozen years? Ya got me beat. I'll sit down and let the adults talk.
Living history. Ioi.
@@ZMB-on5ubever since the raid I've been curious about these stealth Blackhawks but there's no solid info anywhere I've found. I figured eventually they would get declassified and we'd learn all about them like the F117 but that hasn't happened either. It's like an information black hole
Apparently Pakistani radars were turned off that day....
I live about 25-30 miles south of McMinnville, OR, out in the hills.
One night, around 2006-8-ish, the quiet darkness of midnight was pummeled by a deep/low thump-thump-thump shaking the house.
I stepped out and couldn't *hear* ANYTHING, but the clear night sky showed a dark shape passing over directly overhead, blocking out stars, with a few very small lights visible from open side bays.
Not more than 300 feet overhead (I'm at 500 feet elevation, with the local max hill at 650 ft).
Just a big, dark hole in the sky, passing overhead, kinda lozenge shaped.
Stepping back inside, again I could hear the thump lessen as the shadow slowly moved on.
I waved.
Evergreen Helicopters was in McMinnville at the time. And I know for a fact that certain employees there would blanch pale as a ghost when I mentioned my 'silent helo' story.
So you couldn't hear the thump-thump-thump outside? Or was it just far enough away by the time you got outside that you couldn't hear it anymore? It'd be crazy to think we have a helicopter you can't hear until it's directly over you. Awesome!
@@zlm001 There is a well-known effect of extreme low frequency sounds where frequencies too low for humans to hear (generally under 10 Hz) escape detection, especially in open-air environments. BUT if the lower-frequency waves have sufficient energy, they can be indirectly sensed by an observer in an enclosed space (e.g. house) as the energy is transmitted to the walls/roof and shake the enclosure which will usually make a higher-frequency noise. Back when I worked at Rodgers Organ Co in about '82, we would have fun by standing on the two lowest notes (about 14 and 12 Hz) and the resulting beat frequency (around 2 Hz) could not be heard in the voicing room via the huge Cerwin-Vega cabs we had, BUT when you go outside the room, it sounded like an earthquake was happening. IFF they can design rotary blades that put out very low-frequency pressure waves rather than audible sound waves, a similar effect would be heard. I would guess the folks at Evergreen were experimenting with different rotor designs, and were taking potential designs up for a flight test after they'd proved basic safety.
19:50 - nah, even when F-117 was designed, Lockheed conducted studies on visibility and turned out that dark gray will be most versatle one, even at night. USAF demanded pitch black because 'reasons' and actually Nighthawks could be spotted in moon light as patches of moving darkness.
Air Force generals felt that "real pilots don't fly pastel-colored planes" hence why the F-117 Nighthawks were black rather than gray.
Gotta admit though, “patch of moving darkness” sounds kinda badass
It’s the same with tents.
Green and black fabrics are more visible at night than dark blue for example.
Midnight Blue is best when flying at night. Most people don't realize the sky isn't actually black. Same thing with shadows. They are actually grey not black.
@@doncalypsoI never thought of grey as "pastel black" until your post.
Ol' lower enlisted 0311 here, but what I witnessed was the AH-1 SuperCobras (2 blades) beating the air into submission, then either CH-47 or CH-51 would come in for a pickup, and you wouldn't hear it until you saw it. And they were much larger, louder engines. The Cobras you could here and feel beyond the hills! More blades=less bass thump.
In the bin Laden raid, the stealth helicopter entered its own rotor wash, referred to as rotor vortex ring state, and lost lift. It happened because the walls around the compound were 18 feet high when they were expected to be less than half that. That affected the ability of the helicopter to hover. The pilot, from the 160th, did do a great job keeping the helicopter vertical, rather than falling over and dumping everyone out.
The walls were expected to be half that height? One would think that's an important detail to check out beforehand. The operation was rehearsed for weeks.
I don't think that's correct. IIRC, they'd trained using a *chain-link fence* at the model of the compound, which allowed rotor wash to dissipate, so the problem with solid walls wasn't realised.
But you're right about the pilot - he did a great job bring the chopper down.
@@maxhugen Every "compound" ever shown on TV/video in the Middle East has a wall and not a chain-link fence, so I am sure they knew it was a wall. Where did you hear it was chain-link? Just curious.
@@SailorRob That's what I've read when I looked it up a couple of years ago. You can also read Rob O'Neill's book, which says essentially the same thing. He was there, so I think he would know.
@@user-mp9rd4hg8b No doubt they knew it was a wall, but decided to use a fence for whatever reason in their mockup. Source: Alex Holling's video:
czcams.com/video/1Ypflvgs7ZM/video.html
Can’t wait to hear him leverage the word “leverage” in describing this helicopter.
I feel like he saw this comment and then kicked up the usage tenfold
I rewatched the video so I could leverage your comment
I'm not kidding, or even ashamed to admit, that I started using that term at work, as a direct result of the amount of Sandboxx videos I consume 😂
@@wadephillips3887 To be fair I think it's usage would be a lot more fitting in discussing the military in general than almost any other thing. Of course business does the same thing but I don't think to the extent the military has to think about leveraging EVERYTHING. I mean the goal is to gain every advantage you possibly can.
Finally, somebody has finally put it together. I worked on the RAH-66 engine development team (T800). Don't let the history books fool you, the RAH-66 was deemed a success, and everybody on the project knew the truth. I think it was a little "too good", which is why we are all discussing what Sikorsky did with the program.
I have been hypothesizing that the real reason Comanche "failed" was so the Army and Sikorsky could take the program "black" and away from public eyes. It made absolutely no sense to me for the helicopter to be cancelled at that point.
@@xavierwilmerng6317Fall of the Soviet Union and the "peace dividend" up ended a lot of military planning and thoughts.
@@Kriss_L true but things like the F35 were built in a period of relative peace with seemingly no near peer opposition in the horizon. That program was massively over budget yet kept going for some reason or another.
Point is if the US wants a system enough, it will be kept alive through various means. The Comanche was already technologically mature and had already finished going through the cost overruns. With a seeming lack of place in the conventional armed forces, I am guessing they took it "black" to secure a future for at least the technology that was developed. Hence why we now find out there are stealth Blackhawks flying around
@@xavierwilmerng6317 Cancelling a project doesn't mean the technology is thrown away so there's no reason why Comanche couldn't have been cancelled while still retaining an ongoing research program into stealth helicopters that would leverage the work done by Boeing and Sikorski. Plenty of vehicles and weapons have been cancelled despite being ready for service or almost fully developed because of cost and changing requirements.
@@xavierwilmerng6317 TBH I think the F35 is just a job program and a way to provide a "F22" to the Allied and friendly forces, but sans the more classified stuff... Plus USAF gets a top up for their fleet... (F22 procurement was curtailed to a MVP amount)
Great piece, I can't wait to hear the rest! I'm a former Army Black Hawk pilot and I was surprised how deeply I enjoyed the HD Air Assault and formation clips. After a while in civilian life, sometimes I forget how cool it was to be around that.
Having grown up with Airwolf as my favorite TV show, I was thrilled when I found out the company my mother worked for was involved in the Comanche project. I'd pour through the trade pubs featuring the Comanche anytime she'd bring one home. I was saddened to learn one day that the Comanche was axed, but seeing it live on in some other form--particularly as a contributor to the demise of OBL--provides a bit of satisfaction at how it all worked out.
Airwolf, Knight Rider & Street Hawk were among my favourite shows in the 80s
Don't forget Blue Thunder, which brought us Airwolf!
Totally fanciful project back then, Butt???
Tell them I’m not here….Sandboxx is on!
👍👍👍
Commanche maximum overkill was a phenomenal game back in the day, loved it.
Pretty sure that was the first "real" video game I ever played.
Comanche and the F22 lightning games by NOVASOFT in the mid 90's made me the man i am today
@@dannyelliott8391is a
@@KevinDC5 same. Those games and The Aircraft of The World subscription made me the aircraft enthusiast I am today. Well that and living near Oshkosh/EAA. 😂
@@KevinDC5 Was that the game "TFX" where you could fly an F-22 and a Typhoon? I remember being blown away by that game's graphics - playing that along with Doom and Doom 2. Good times!
Alex I dont know if you'll see this, but thank you. Your content is peerless and so enjoyable. Im just a civilian av geek with a particular interest in helos, and have been waiting for this level of rigor on the reporting of this since the world learned about the stealth blackhawk, when my jaw dropped along with every other av geek, let alone service personnel at the time. More power to you and all you create, its excellent and i love every minute of the uploads 🤘👍
Love the Comanche. Almost as much as the F-35. Would love to fly in one.
Called LHX early on, back when I did a tiny bit of work on it, on one of the sensors, actually. I'm not too sure what this guy is talking about. There was a drawing on the cover of some of the program materials, that didn't look terribly different than the final configuration. That book wasn't classified.
I didn't even know a stealth Blackhawk existed.
I'll pick the Su-57. Where shall we meet?😀
@@hundun5604 Over China?
It's just so damned COOL! I actually have an irrational, but deep-set fear of helicopters, to the point that I don't like being near them when they are running. That said, the Comanche is just so freaking cool looking, that I would be first in line for a ride in one.
I'm a B21 Raider fan myself
My gut turns inside out whenever I learn of these instances. From D-21's lost over Siberia and China, a P-3 Orion given up to China, a RQ-170 recovered by Iran and this incident with the Blackhawk. (Also operation Merlin as a bonus)
We probably have stuff that would look like magic to the common man.
And F-117 tech to China as well.... SMH
@@RC-fp1tl F-35. Well I assume they got some data about the F-117 from Russia.
However, look at how NOT stealth the Russian and Chinese fighters are.
@@recoil53 The f117 shootdown incident parts were shipped to China. China hacked the F35 program, but basically bought the f117 parts.
Lol, J20 might be an actual contender tho, and they're allegedly producing a lot of them. Yikes. Here's hoping the F22 can wipe the floor with them.
@@recoil53 I mean, the Chinese have some decent looking stealth fighters.
Comanche Gold. I loved that game as a kid. Always a choice between going loud with extra munitions or quiet with just the internal payload and fancy flying (trench run mission). Some missions just begged for dozens of hydra rockets.
I 100% could see the lessons learned from the Comanche was leveraged into a stealth transport helicopter.
Comanche Gold, F22 Raptor, and Joint Strike Fighter... I played those for hours on end!
those hydras were a lot of fun!
@@Sleepy7666those games were my shit. I think i was playing them when I was like 7 years old
Also Ace Combat and Command and Conquer
Speaking of games, Fireblade is another that had the players flying a helicopter with stealth technologies.
Really wish the Comanche was made in this era it's such a great-looking helicopter
My brother was a Helicopter detailer when he started. He the became a designer at Butler. Then he got his phd working on Blackhawks. Then he went to Sikorsky still working on Backhawks in 1998. He left Sikorsky in 2019.
Love the Black Hawks with all the variants!
I thank you for this series you started as I know it will be informative but my favorite is from the Vietnam ERA!
The Hughes OH-6 Cayuse (the flying egg) was involved in a few CIA clandestine where the chopper was modified and was labeled the "QUITE ONE". peace
Money pits
I remember that day. I also remember the news broadcaster specifically state that the soldiers were brought in by ordinary helicopters. Then the image of the tall section that was anything but ordinary flashed up. I was stunned. So was my brother. It was painfully obvious that there was a toe off helicopter in the us inventory that we did not know about
‘Toe off’?
@@AtheistOrphanProbably "type of."
Thought I was losing it for a minute thinking, "Haven't I already seen this video days ago?"
Same here, and to add that, the channel "Naked Science" also had another video with "Secrets of Super Skyscrapers" in their thumbnail (their 2nd video in a row with that in the thumbnail).
I had to do a double take to see if i hadn't accidentally scrolled down in my subscription feed.
But yeah, they are actually separate videos and not reuploaded.
In the 1980’s there was a huge contract competition between the SuoerTeam (Bell/McDonnell Douglas) & the First Team (Sikorsky\Boeing) to develop a small, stealthy LHX (Light Helicopter eXperimental) scout, attack helicopter, to replace the Army’s aging fleet, of overloaded Bell OH-58D Kiowa Warrior scout helicopters.
I liked Bell/McDonnell Douglas’ design better, because it looked more futuristic, it could carry more weapons payload, & it was more quiet with its NOTAR anti torque system.
But Sikorsky & Boeing the First Team won, & their less advanced looking LHX design was named the RAH-66 Comanche. The Comanche was a quantum leap forward in technology, but the Comanche’s inherent problem was its small size. But, the LHX (Light Helicopter eXperimental) had Light in its name for a reason. If it was a full sized attack helicopter then McDonnell Douglas could consider that encroaching on their contract for the mission of their AH-64 Apache helicopters.
The problem was, the Army asked for a small, light reconnaissance helicopter, but they kept wanting extra things added to it. Comanche was also plagued with vibration problems in its tail section.
But anyway, the Army quietly, wanted a stealthy Utility Helicopter that could fly on missions with the LHX (Comanche) & this secret program was dubbed the MHX (Missions Helicopter eXperimental). Once again, the helicopter companies competed & this time, McDonnell Douglas definitely seemed to have the better MHX design with its super quiet NOTAR anti torque system.
Sikorsky had its low observable Model S-70 (UH-60) Black Hawk design since 1978, as he mentioned in the video.
Of course, the MHX project was a lot more hush, hush because it was a secret, black budget project. So, there’s not a lot known about the MHX project. It had seemed to quietly fizzle out in the late 1990’s.
But, the bin Laden raid, with the MHX-60 Silent Hawk, that got into a ring tip vortice state, had to make an emergency landing on the compound wall, because it couldn’t generate enough lift to remain airborne. Fortunately the 160th pilot put it down relatively undamaged & possibly still flyable. The pilot wanted to fly it out of there, but the higher ups said to blow it in place.
There were two generations of the MHX Silent Hawks. The first iteration was highly modified with a new tail section, 5-bladed tail rotor with a hub cap looking shroud. It still had the standard S-70 4 bladed rotor head, but it had anhedral blade tips that angled downwards, which GREATLY reduced blade vortex interaction, which creates a loud blade slap, popping sound. The rest of the Black Hawk was modified with bolt on pieces to reduce its RADAR observability. But, the shape & added weight made the modified MHX-60’s very unstable, cumbersome & difficult to fly. The 160th pilots famously hated the prototype MHX-60’s & they said they flew like a cow.
Sikorsky did do a better total redesign from the ground up on the second generation of the MHX-60, making vast improvements, including adding a fifth rotor blade on the main rotor system, & using all composite materials to make it much lighter. The improved, 2nd generation MHX-60 was named the Ghost Hawk, & looks very similar to the Ghost Hawk movie prop helicopters depicted in the movie “Zero Dark Thirty”.
For the bin Laden raid the problem was, this joint task force could not get F-117 bomber support from Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, to drop a bomb, if one of the TOP SECRET, more advanced Ghost Hawks was shot down. Therefore; the command would not allow the MHX Ghost Hawks to be used.
Instead, to the chagrin of the 160th pilots, they were forced to fly the 2 original MHX Silent Hawk prototype helicopters that flew like a cow. The 160th vehemently protested & simply wanted to use their advanced MH-60 helicopters, which had a lot better performance than the cumbersome, sluggish MHX Silent Hawks. Even the Navy SEAL’s protested using the old, experimental MHX helicopters.
But, both the Navy SEALS, & the 160th SOAR pilots were overridden & ordered to use the less capable MHX Silent Hawks on the mission. Honestly, the near crash most likely wouldn’t have happened if our special operators had been permitted to use either the more capable MHX Ghost Hawk, or the proven MH-60 similar to the Air Force’s Pave Hawk.
It’s a fascinating story. Unfortunately, everyone, including our enemies know about our stealth MHX Black Hawk program.
The lesson learned, should be for commanders to always listen to their special operators. Hopefully, some day, the military will declassify the secretive stealth MHX program & we can finally see these mysterious stealth Black Hawks.
Awesome video. You are very knowledgeable & accurate with your information.
I am freaking psyched about this series! This is by far my favorite channel!
Alex you are the best in explaining such complex air platforms. Thank from a landlubber. Tom.
I remember when this channel first started. I thought the early videos were highly mediocre, on telling us what we already knew --- little did I know what the channel would become!! This was fantastic! Excellent job researching and explaining in an easy to understand manner!!
You're killing it, Alex! Great work as always.
Late 70s airborne infantry. If we weren't jumping out of c130s or c-141, it was the UH1. Don't remember which variation. We rode knees in the breeze. One night over gatun lake in Panama during my first of two jungle training schools at fort Sherman, we were on a night mission but first we circled over gatun lake, about 1,200 feet over a anchored freighter. Before heading off to our drop zone. Those were the days and no stuff there. They could hear you miles away coming and forget about any armor for the grunts in the back, not that the pilots had much either. We rarely ever closed the doors. Even in cold weather I don't remember us closing doors unless we're going to be on a big hop. I was out when the Blackhawks came into service. Right after I get out my best friend went into the Air Force and after working on the a-10 for a while he graduated to nellis and groom lake where he worked on the f-117. I didn't find out about that until a long time after we knew what the f-117 was.
The US needs to bring back something like the Comanche. With the little birds being retired and nothing in the wing that we know of to replace it, something like the Comanche that would be integrated to the Apaches, J-Stars and command and control. But it certainly won't match the tilt-rotor is that are on the horizon in speed. But it would be excellent for the forward edge of the battlefield. They don't even need to be manned. Maybe none of them and they are controlled by stealth helicopters to the rear.
Regarding the number of rotor blades, the rotor tips travel near supersonic. Dividing the lift requirement by adding another blade can reduce tip speed/noise by a reduction of tip speed via RPM, or diameter.
This is a great video. Deeply researched and very interesting. Well done Alex! Can't wait fir the next one.
Yeah, I remember when I heard a Blackhawk had crashed at the Bin Laden raid, after I finished cheering and saw that tail hanging over the wall, my eyes must have grown as big as dinner plates and I must have said out loud: "Whoah! That's not a Blackhawk tail! What is that?"
What I've heard about helicopter (and drone) rotors is that what can be done to reduce noise is to unevenly space them, since the loud "chop-chop" sound is due to each blade passing through the wake left by the preceding blade. Unevenly space them would drastically reduce that sound. We see that in the Stealth Blackhawk's tail rotor. Interestingly, there are videos online where developers have designed Y-shaped and stepped rotors that DRASTICALLY reduce the loud buzz of low flying drones to a whisper.
That was awesome, great job Alex! Keep up the great work!
I was in the Navy from 1982 to 1986. We were experimenting with stealth coatings starting in 1985 on the F-14.
The F-14 is one of my all-time favourite aircraft and even today it’s still the pride of the Iranian Air Force. (America’s ONLY export customer for the type). I remember building an Airfix kit of it as a kid.
Years ago, I recall hearing officials and politicians saying the US doesn't have anything like THAT ( a different technology) whereas we knew it existed because we were just using it. Such were the days of Vietnam.
I'm loving this whole series great job as usual
I'm so excited for future videos exploring this topic
Much awaited much appreciated excellent insights as always from you.
Love your stories man keep up the good work.
This is great stuff, Alex
Alex, awesome vid bro!!
Well Sargeant,
You dropped a load of info in this video. Can't wait for the next one in line!
Well done!
I love it. I rode in and fast roped out of a bunch of black hawks during training in the Army, but sadly my MOS was 13A and fooling around with helicopters was deemed non mission essential. 😐
Nice work Alex!
cant wait to see your other videos on this. truly interesting
Excellent video Alex!
Did anyone ever see the Mel Gibson movie, Conspiracy Theory? There is a scene in that movie where a very quiet, stealth helicopter manages to maneuver above the character portrayed by Gibson, and send operatives repelling down ropes, all in broad daylight on a busy Manhattan boulevard.
Thanks, Alex! I'm hooked on the mini-series idea. Can hardly wait.
Great video and detail!
Alex Hollings - always with the calm, informed analysis. I have a feeling the next video about the larger picture will tell us more than any reports from the lads with the boots on the ground.
Great job Alex!
Excellent, as always.
Thank you for your service! Great video!
can't wait to hear the rest! This is like the ultimate tease show!
Thank you, Alex. As an aviation enthusiast, with your videos I am back in school. Interesting how information comes out over time. Thank you again.
well this is damned cool. i thought i could just watch while i was having lunch or something but this needed my full attention. and it'll need multiple viewings, and not just as white noise.
love the work.
Thanks so much for the info, Alex !
I was a Sikorsky technical rep for the SH60B, HH60H, UH60 and the CH53Es from 1984 to 2012. I never heard a peep about the stealth Blackhawk. I am very surprised by accuracy of this video. I didn't find any technical errors about the Blackhawk info. I would like to add some info about the tail design of the H60. One of the original design requirements was that it must be able to be transported inside a C130 and be rapidly ready for use after unloading. To meet this requirement the horizontal tail had to be placed below the main rotor and therefore into the main rotor wash. Because it is in the main rotor wash it had to be movable. This added much complexity and unreliability. The C130 carry requirement was gone long ago but the now unnecessary complex tail design remains. Same thing goes for the canted tail rotor.
I spent a few years as a C-130 Crew Chief. I remember someone telling me that they originally wanted the Blackhawk to be transportable by Herk. I wondered why they changed their mind. He simply said, "They probably put a Blackhawk next to a 130 and asked 'how?'."
That would be a tight fit regardless.
@@Plaprad it was a tight fit. Doesn't the outside of the Blackhawk look like the inside of a C130? They had to lower the rotor head and fold the tail. I heard there was a modification in the overhead of the C130 that won't allow the fit anymore.
@@jnbfrancisco IIRC, and this is from twenty years ago, so it could be wrong. I think they modified the "hog trough" to be lower and larger many years ago.
I was thinking more about the wing box. I've seen some big stuff packed into a herk, but I just can't see something like a Blackhawk getting under the wing box without modification.
Absolutely riveting informational drop lots to digest and grasp.
Great job! Thanks
The coating that you described in the video was applied to a few V-22 Ospreys back in the early 2000’s.
Any guesses as to it's designation?
Mine is NEH-60A, at least for the first trial ones. But that's based on an old picture that looks like it was taken in the 80s or 90s of a stealth Blackhawk (which lacks the stabilator disc). I suppose it does make sense to use this variant for its EW capability. But it is likely the more modern ones have a different designation.
Great Stuff!!!
Excellent work! Looking forward to learning the rest of this story. I, like you, saw the pic of this on TV in 2011 and said "wtf is THAT!?"
This whole video is a flex. Great job.
Great article, more please.
The stealth helicopters were talked about in an article in Aviation Week magazine many years before that crash. I remember it clearly and when that Blackhawk crashed at the compound - I was telling everybody it wasn’t new news about the stealth helicopters. Because - I remembered the story in Aviation Week.
I think Jetoptera may be quietly working on a replacement for the Stealth Blackhawk platform, they were contracted by the government for military application of their technology, and it's been very quiet about what they are developing since then
Great show. I shared it.
If you think a 75% reduction in RCS is awesome, take the fourth root of (1 - 0.75). That's only a 30% reduction in radar detection range. True stealth is about orders of magnitude (powers of 10) reduction in RCS not single digit factors.
I was just trying to research this last week. This video came out at the perfect time for me.
Great reporting!!! I can't wait for the balance.
Aloha and congratulations on all of your accomplishments and success, it’s well deserved!
My question is this- was it stealth we saw in 1989? I was bodyboarding with my college best friend at Makapuʻu beach on Oahu. It’s not far from Kaneohe Bay Marine Corp Base, so we often saw military craft in the area. The day in question was in late May/early June 1989 & the surf was epic at Makapu’u. I’d spent the prior day shooting there (I used to do some professional surf photography), so I was jonesing to get in the water. We got there before sunrise & had the beach to ourselves, outside of the really quiet helicopters hovering above the cliffs, I’d estimate 400m away from us.
They showed up about 20 minutes after we got there and the both of us were in awe. We’d seen many helicopters in the area over the years, but you always heard them coming. These were ‘cooler’ looking and all black- very sleek compared to everything else we’d seen. My Pops was a retired Capt. in the USAF, his folks retired Navy & then worked for a Government agency- we’d grown up in and around military aircraft, so what struck us both was how quiet they were. While the surf was decent size, there was hardly any wind and at that time of the day, and on s.e. Oahu, not much road traffic to muffle or disguise the noise of a (jet) turbo-shaft engine (if I got the engine wrong, apologies- I’m a car guy). Not sure if you can shed any light on this, but it would be cool to know what we actually saw. Mahalo & aloha!
I would suspect an early NOTAR. The tail rotors make most of the noise.
2:35 dang bro, looking hard! 👍🏼
Thanks and quite interesting. Thanks
Thank you for posting another extremely exciting and fascinating documentary of US aviation & technology. Kind regards from Austria, Europe!😃
This video is very validating to me. I was a huge fan of the RAH-66 Comanche back middle/high school. I was always a military aviation buff and I had Comanche 4 on the family computer at home. Even though it never made it to production, I thought the design was awesome. I drew the chopper on the whiteboard during free time. I used a top down view to show off the 5 blade rotor. Then a kid came up to me and told me it didn't exist because there's no such thing as a 5 blade helicopter. How did he know? His dad was in the military lol. I even explained that it's not in service and that it was a concept and prototype. Anyway, I'm looking forward to more about the stealth Blackhawk!
Are you me?! 😂 I used to draw the Comanche in middle school too and got told that doesn't exist by a bully and Google the fact checker wasn't in my pocket back then. 😂
@@Sleepy7666 i swear that's the same thing that happened to me lol.
Always love your work! Would love to see anything you can write about the Russian Ka-52 helicopter. Would be interesting because of its unique coaxial twin blades and supposed “ejection seats”. 😅
Yeah! I find that the ejection mechanism is extremely unique, ejecting the blades before dragging the pilots upwards out of the cockpit is one way to solve the problem of the human blender blocking ejection
There have been a number of dual coaxial rotor helicopters, including several American technology demonstrators (one of which, I suspect Russian engineers took some inspiration from) and a chubby little anti-submarine / transport helo in Soviet service. We still see the latter in use during the Russo-Ukrainian War today.
Great work, keep digging…
Nailed it! Radar, noise & heat signatures are real concerns for copters! Channeling the exhaust up under the rotors then U turning heat it out into the prop wash to dispel it is a doable! The noise signature off the props may be deflected away on another angle, viable blade TIP geometry & frequency generation! EW signature blurring generation on a short range may be another viable trick!
15:25 that design is still stunning today in 2023. Absolutely masterful work on the choppa
Alex, you did this once before as well, "mil" and "mm" are not the same thing, 10-12mm is nearly a 1/2inch thick, a coating of paint is potentially 10-12mil thick. This is .010.012", or the thickness of about 3 sheets of paper. One is Metric, one is Imperial, they are not interchangeable.
Semper Fi Jarhead
Thanks Alex
I remember being a mad plane spotter in UK, prior to an air show, in the mid 90's. a us flight was coming in for fly past and reported to atc about their approach through a north sea rain squall the reply was we can see you though we did not expect too, rumours went around that Rain was the cause of increased radar reflection.
thank you sergeant - a very illuminating. I did not know the extent of what I did not know. I am fairly sure there is a lot more that I do not know.
It's wild that this predates the F-117.
In Vietnam the CIA used modified 'quiet bird' Hughes 500P helicopters for psychological operations , commando raids and dropping radio beacons / listening devices . It was very quiet they say , but lacked the power and stability of the unmodified versions .
They should of gotten “Airwolf”. If you grew up in the 1980’s you know exactly what I’m talking about lol. I use to love that show just because of Airwolf. The A-Team was on after it and those were some of my favorite shows. Macgyver , the original one,which was on Monday night at 7 pm was my favorite show in the 80’s. I was only 10 years old in 1987 but I loved these shows. The 80’s did have some awesome shows. Dukes of Hazard was another one
That F-22 pilot was SPADTASTIC!!!
Great video Sarge. Thanks for your service in the Marines from a Retired Reccepatrolman of 1st CSOR. I knew I liked you for some reason...probably was the abuse we both took to wear our uniforms!! LOL It was worth it, made me a much better person today than I would have been if I didn't serve.
Speaking of coatings, have you done any vids on the silver F-35 and F-117 ? Thanks for this vid, Alex.
I think he did. I remember him talking about the gold canopy on the raptors
please include chapters in your videos, it would help tremendously as i like to go back and rewatch certain portions of the video :)
Thanks!
I think all the Ninja helicopter programs were started with the Hughes 500P quiet one. Howard Hughes is a genius, the Tony Stark of the 60s
Outstanding! I’m looking forward to how you think the stealth hawk looked
Very cool
This is cool interesting series
" and THIS IS, A I R P O W E R!" I love that.
Ahh fan 4 life now brother! 😅
Semper Fi
A quick point, Alex, on the rotor blades. I believe, from what have read, that increasing the number of blades has the effect of slowing the rotor tips down from supersonic to subsonic, therefore reducing a large part of the rotor tip noise. And enclosing the tail rotor tips also takes away this same noise. I suppose having another blade in the hub may also increase lift somewhat while reducing stress on the rotor hub and potentially vibration.
If you have more blades you can make them shorter and still have the same lift, so the tips don't break the sound barrier. At least that's the case if I remember correctly.
@@zlm001 no, that is entirely wrong