MM - Ward is a bit behind the times on the Seaphoon proposal, which is now based on thrust vectoring to reduce Vapp without an extreme angle of attack (which in turns means that the pilot can see the deck). He's also a little unclear on how a non-STOVL jet can benefit from a ski-jump - the physics are the same as STOVL although the speeds are higher. And the reason you don't have ski-jumps on land is that you would thereby make the runway one-ended, and unusable for landings.
[Engines posted while I was writing this. I don't see reaction control systems in the latest Seaphoon proposals. I am not a big fan of Seaphoon, anyway.]
As for Gripen, the pitch (which I am not endorsing, just conveying) is that the existing jet is already designed for STOL, so it has low Vapp (125-160 kt), good low-speed handling, inherently precise approach, and the structure for no-flare landings; the E/F's new gear and centersection is being designed so that a higher-sink-rate version can be generated quite easily; and that it can be STOBAR or CATOBAR according to choice.
Also, some expeditionary services might care to note that the Gripen will fly happily all day long off an 800 m runway, which is shorter than what they expect to use for F-35B. And I would love to see what an F-35A would do on an 800 m SCREECH CRASH BANG road base.
I expect that F-35A should haul its internal load further than most things from an unrestricted runway. What I was speculating about was whether a STOBAR fighter, particularly F-35B-sized, could match its 3000 lb/450 nm HHH from a realistic deck run.
Last edited by LowObservable; 9th Jun 2012 at 13:47.