Marines' Osprey is just an albatross
J. Stryker Meyer
Commentary
The Marine Corps calls its controversial MV-22 tilt-rotor hybrid aircraft the Osprey. A better name would be the albatross. Or perhaps, the killer albatross. If Dwight Eisenhower were alive, he'd point to the MV-22 as the epitome of how the military-industrial complex can foist an inadequate aircraft upon the military at great expense to taxpayers.
On Dec. 5, a decision will be made whether the MV-22 should go into the first round of full production by Bell Helicopter-Boeing. The production schedule calls for 360 of the aircraft with 38-foot prop-rotors to be built at $40 million to $70 million each.
It is billed as the future of Marine Corps aviation. It can fly like a turboprop airplane and while in flight, the wings rotate upward, with the nacelles locking into place above the aircraft, giving it the flight characteristics of a helicopter. It's supposed to replace the aging, Vietnam-era helicopters, the CH-46 and CH-53. If the green light is given, American taxpayers will spend billions on an aircraft that many specialists say has a fatal design flaw and has failed to live up to its performance criteria. The aircraft that has moved through the military and congressional approval process with serious flaws hidden from Congress and the public by obfuscation and deception blanketed under an iron veil of military secrecy.
As a military affairs reporter for the North County Times, I covered some aspects of what the military calls its operational evaluation, in which it tests the aircraft on a day-to-day basis. I've flown in it, talked to mechanics who have worked on it and to brave, dedicated recon Marines who have flown in it. I've also talked to knowledgeable skeptics who say this albatross should be buried before it kills more young Marines during training missions.
Here are some of the reasons it should be terminated from military use. The aircraft has a fatal flaw. It's called power settling, or asymmetrical vortex ring state. Power setting occurs when one prop-rotor loses its lift capability while in flight. When that happens, the other prop-rotor continues to grip the air, pulling the aircraft upward and into a roll before turning toward the earth and plowing into the ground with deadly force, as the MV-22 did in an April 8 crash in Marana, Ariz. It crashed during a test flight, carrying 19 Marines, killing everyone aboard.
The Marine Corps laid blame for the crash on the pilots, saying they exceeded the flight parameters of the aircraft. The military says the pilots exceeded the recommended rate of descent of 800 feet per minute. But some critics have asked when that rate of descent was placed in the training manual for the MV-22. Was it before or after April 8? One source said it was placed in the manual in June.
Neither power settling nor asymmetrical vortex ring state were programmed into computer-controlled flight simulator programs that the pilots used while learning how to fly the MV-22. They had to log a minimum of 65 hours on the flight simulators, yet there was no training in place for power settling. In May, Helicopter News editor John R.
Guardino stated, "There is a serious knowledge gap concerning the Osprey and (power settling).
While the phenomenon affects all helicopters, it may pose a special (asymmetric) challenge to the MV-22."
Many of the early pilots for the MV-22 were drawn from fixed-wing aircraft. Helicopter pilots learn about power settling and train for it. But with this new bird, little if any training was conducted on power settling. Now the Navy and Marines are looking into having power settling programmed into their flight simulators.
During the operational evaluation and early tests of the MV-22, to save time and money, the more dangerous flight profiles such as power settling were not tested. The fact that test pilots cut corners by flying only the less dangerous profiles is documented in an accident report, one insider said. However, neither the public nor the families of Marines killed on April 8 will ever see the critical comments in the accident report. And the pilots' flight logs, which document problems and concerns with the MV-22, are not available for public scrutiny.
It wasn't until 21 Aug that test pilots attempted to duplicate some of the crash conditions at Naval Aircraft Test Center in Patuxent River, Md., Marine Corps Col. Nolan Schmidt, the V-22 program manager, told "Inside The Pentagon" magazine. The military boasts about the MV-22's ability to fly farther than any helicopter, with midair refuel capabilities, and to carry huge amounts of weight...and the MV-22 may be good for routine ferrying of troops and cargo. Yet even in that area, there is a concern. Buried deep in one report is the fact that it takes 20 minutes for military personnel wearing goggles to unload a vehicle from the MV-22. The vehicle fits so tightly into the aircraft that air crew members have to be careful not to tear the inside of the aircraft when removing it.
Also, special aluminum planks have to be placed inside the MV-22 before a vehicle is driven inside it, because without those planks the aircraft floor can't support the weight of the vehicle.
I have an opinion about this, stemming from my days in Vietnam, when I ran top-secret reconnaissance missions into Laos and Cambodia during two tours of duty with Special Forces. A key to recon team success on a mission was quick insertion into a target area. I've been inserted into targets by Air Force, Army and South Vietnamese pilots. The key was a quick approach into the landing zone, and our six-man recon team exiting the helicopter quickly, running to the wood line as the aircraft hastily exited the area.
The MV-22 can't approach a landing zone as quickly or as hard as a helicopter. The MV-22 has to spend more time on the landing zone than a helicopter because the men inside have to exit down a rear ramp. With the old UH-1H, or Hueys, and today's modern UH-60, there are two doors, where the men can watch the ground as the ship approaches the landing zone, while others can watch the wood line for enemy forces.
In the MV-22, there is no observation option. There are no defensive weapons. On the helicopters, there are door gunners on each side. With the MV-22, the men inside are blind to the target until the tailgate goes down.
I hope I'm wrong about more Marines dying in training in the MV-22.
The Marine Corps' rotor aviation wing finds itself between a rock and hard place. The helicopters they're flying are old and require extensive maintenance. Marine leaders have banked their future on the MV-22, instead of the modern CH-60 helicopter. Yet mechanics on MV-22s say intensive labor is needed to keep these new aircraft in the air. What will happen after they've been around for a decade or two?
There should be a full congressional hearings on the MV-22 before any funding is approved for full production. The hearings should feature the men who actually fly the aircraft, the critics who have seen the problems and have been stifled from speaking publicly. The hearings should present testimony from flight crews, not the likes of Col. Schmidt or any of the generals who want the MV-22. A GAO investigation of the MV-22 has turned up damning information. However, the GAO moves slowly and no time has been set for the release of that critical report.
J. Stryker Meyer is a North County Times staff writer.
11/26/00