woody@eos.arc.nasa.gov (Wayne Wood) (08/22/90)
From: Wayne Wood <woody@eos.arc.nasa.gov> In article <1990Aug15.031944.25575@cbnews.att.com> graham!john@uunet.UU.NET (John Braun) writes: > > >From: graham!john@uunet.UU.NET (John Braun) > > I wonder what B52 strikes would accomplish against Iraqi dug-in >positions. ever heard of "arclight"? a b52 flies over an area and saturates it with 250/500/1000 pounders... it ain't accurate, and it ain't pretty, but if you hit a bunker hard enough, for long enough, it stops being a bunker and becomes a smoking hole in the ground. the ground shakes. /*** woody **************************************************************** *** ...tongue tied and twisted, just an earth bound misfit, I... *** *** -- David Gilmour, Pink Floyd *** ****** woody@eos.arc.nasa.gov *** my opinions, like my mind, are my own ******/
0003751365@mcimail.com (Thomas J Klotzbach) (08/24/90)
From: Thomas J Klotzbach <0003751365@mcimail.com> Wayne Wood writes: > a b52 files over an area and saturates it with 250/500/1000 pounders... > it ain't accurate, and it ain't pretty, but if you hit a bunker hard > enough, for long enough, it stops being a bunker and becomes a > smoking hole in the ground. Things have changed a lot since Vietnam. All B-52's now have a completly re-designed Offensive Avionics System (OAS), which allows for MUCH greater accuracy in low-level and high-level missions. Anyways, I don't think you would see a high-level gravity ordnance mission. You're more apt to see the bombers used for a stand-off role by utilizing their ALCM's, as they can be fitted with a conventional warhead. Deadly accurate, and hard to defend against. tom_who_wishes_he_was_on_a_SAC_ramp_right_now ******************************************************************************** Thomas J. Klotzbach MCI Mail : 375-1365 Programmer/Analyst Work : (716) 343-0055 x358 Genesee Community College Batavia, NY 14020 *******************************************************************************
sysmgr@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU (Doug Mohney) (08/31/90)
From: sysmgr@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU (Doug Mohney) In article <1990Aug24.034016.305@cbnews.att.com>, 0003751365@mcimail.com (Thomas J Klotzbach) writes: |Things have changed a lot since Vietnam. All B-52's now have a completly |re-designed Offensive Avionics System (OAS), which allows for MUCH greater |accuracy in low-level and high-level missions. Anyways, I don't think you would |see a high-level gravity ordnance mission. You're more apt to see the bombers |used for a stand-off role by utilizing their ALCM's, as they can be fitted with |a conventional warhead. Deadly accurate, and hard to defend against. I beg to differ. You can't (yet) use ALCMs to hit moving targets. B-52s would be used to carpet-bomb formations in the desert 'cuz there's no place to hide...
daveh%tekcrl.labs.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET (David Hatcher) (09/02/90)
From: David Hatcher <daveh%tekcrl.labs.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET> In article <1990Aug24.034016.305@cbnews.att.com> 0003751365@mcimail.com (Thomas J Klotzbach) writes: > >From: Thomas J Klotzbach <0003751365@mcimail.com> > >Wayne Wood writes: > >> a b52 files over an area and saturates it with 250/500/1000 pounders... >> it ain't accurate, and it ain't pretty, but if you hit a bunker hard >> enough, for long enough, it stops being a bunker and becomes a >> smoking hole in the ground. > >Things have changed a lot since Vietnam. All B-52's now have a completly >re-designed Offensive Avionics System (OAS), which allows for MUCH greater >accuracy in low-level and high-level missions. Anyways, I don't think you would >see a high-level gravity ordnance mission. You're more apt to see the bombers >used for a stand-off role by utilizing their ALCM's, as they can be fitted with >a conventional warhead. Deadly accurate, and hard to defend against. I also want to point out that for saturation bombing, you can't get to many 1000 pounders on a B52. During Vietnam, the primary bomb used for saturation bombing on B52's were 250 pounders. You don't make creaters as large as 500/1000 pounders do, but you cover a much larger area simply because you can carry twice as many bombs. If my memory serves me correctly, we were putting 112 of the 250 pound bombs on each B52 during Vietnam. There were 3 planes per pod with each pod taking off around every 50 min. That was for 24 hour a day, everyday. The only exception was during the bombing of Hanoi. During that period of time we went to a pod taking off every 35 min or so. The only place where I would see a need for that kind of bombing is if Iraq just let the flood gates open with all of its 165,000 plus troups in an invasion of Saudi Arabia. And in that case, those 250 pounders just may be replaced with 250 pound anti-personal bombs. David Hatcher
jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW) (09/13/90)
From: jtchew@csa3.lbl.gov (JOSEPH T CHEW) I believe that after a short experience with the "latest and greatest" B-52 variants in Vietnam, i.e., the B-52G and B-52H, SAC realized that the plane was pretty highly optimized for long-range missions with a few thermonuclear weapons, and that for conventional bombs it ran into a volume limit well short of its weight limit. So they put out an rush order for a modification called "Big Belly" (pretty much what it sounds like) to older B-52Ds. These planes could carry a _lot_ more conventional ordnance. If memory and dubious (civilian) sources of information further serve, the Big Belly planes were mothballed in Arizona in the mid-70s and presumably have not undergone the numerous upgrades (most notably to avionics) of the later models. Are these aircraft just junk waiting to happen, or is somebody chasing the snakes out of them in anticipation of dropping a lot of iron bombs on Iraq? --Joe "Just another personal opinion from the People's Republic of Berkeley"
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (09/13/90)
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) >From: cognos!geovision!pt@dciem (Paul Tomblin) >... I.E., can we deliver a 10 ton >earthquake bomb with that precision. I doubt that we have anything like the >Grand Slam available in this era of Nukes, but if we did, could we lift it? Easily. Aircraft in general have gotten bigger since WWII, and the advent of turbine engines has done amazing things. Many modern *fighters* have payloads comparable to those of WWII heavy bombers. Max bombload for a B-52 is something like 40 tons, although there are some restrictions on how that's distributed (in particular, I don't think it can be all in one piece). I don't have numbers handy, but long odds the bigger tactical aircraft could haul a 10-tonner. -- TCP/IP: handling tomorrow's loads today| Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology OSI: handling yesterday's loads someday| henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry
ab3o+@andrew.cmu.edu (Allan Bourdius) (09/14/90)
From: Allan Bourdius <ab3o+@andrew.cmu.edu> The maximum bomb load of a B-52G/H is in the vicinity of 65,000 pounds. A B-lB can carry nearly twice that (120,000 lbs). As far as ten-ton loads go, even an A-6E can carry over 30,000 lbs of ordnance. MIDN 3/C Allan Bourdius Carnegie Mellon University NROTC