Und einen "Diffusor" setzt man hinter eine Schaufel und in den Luftstrom, damit dieser "verteilt" wird. Das macht man allerdings nur bei einem Föhn so, denn eine Jetturbine sollte möglichst konzentrierte Ströme abgeben. Wer einen Diffusor vor seine Turbine setzt, verringert die Menge angesaugter Luft. Da kann man den Lufteinlass direkt kleiner machen oder die Turbine drosseln.

Ich finde kein Bild der RQ-170 Sentinel im US-Dienst, das dieses Gitter nutzt. Auf manchen Bildern sieht man nur einen dunklen Schatten im Einlass (vgl. hier http://www.defencetalk.com/pictures/g5112-...-sentinel.html). Es wäre auch äußerst ungewöhnlich, denn vergleichbare Flugzeuge der USA nutzen diese Vorrichtung nicht. Und schon gar nicht würde man (aus was Metall zu sein scheint) im rechten Winkel etwas vor den Lufteinlass flanschen. Rechte Winkel sind ein No Go im Stealth. Insbesondere vor den ansonsten speziell zur Reduzierung der Radarsignatur angefertigten großen Flächen und Öffnungen, wie z. B. Turbineneinlässen.

Das Gitter soll verhindern dass Gegenstände (z.B. Steine, Dreck, ..) in das Triebwerk eingesaugt werden. In Kandahar hatte man offenbar nicht vor jedem Start solche freundlichen Reinigungskräfte zur Hand. http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/kandah...ure-id563577849 (Bild aus Kandahar)

Schönes Filmchen, vor allem bei 00.28 wenn man, trotz Sichtschutzgitter
(ähh sorry Radarabweiser) durch den ganzen Vogel sehen kann.

Ich glaube ich habe mich in meinem letzten Post nicht deutlich genug ausgedrückt: Ich bin mir ziemlich sicher, dass das Gitter vor dem Lufteinlass der RQ-170 dazu dient die gut reflektierenden Triebwerksschaufeln von Radarstrahlen abzuschirmen, bzw. diese zu zerstreuen, analog zu den Gittern der F-117. Das ist eine preiswerte Methode die RCS der Drohne zu reduzieren, ohne auf kompliziertere Methoden wie etwa die Formung des Einlasskanals zurückgreifen zu müssen, wie bei der F-22 oder F-35 (diesen Spielraum hat man bei dieser Drohne auch gar nicht.

Laut russischem Verteidigungsministerium, hat die Admiral Kuznetsov den Verlust einer MiG-29 zu beklagen


Sorry, Link von Sputnik

Die Su-34, die im letzten Sommer verunglückte, wird wahrscheinlich wieder hergerichtet.

Russians Blame MiG-29K Crash on Broken Arrestor Cable, Catastrophic Engine Failure

November 21, 2016

A combination of faults on Russia’s carrier and an unexpected total engine shutdown led to a Russian pilot ditching his fighter in the Mediterranean Sea last week, read a translation of a Monday Russian press report.

The Mikoyan MiG-29K that crashed on Nov. 13 was part of a trio of fighters sortied from Russian carrier Admiral Kuznetsov for operations over Syria, USNI News reported last week.

Following the mission – armed reconnaissance runs over targets near Aleppo, USNI News understands — the fighters headed back to the carrier to land, read a translation of a report from Gazeta.ru.

“Upon completion of their flight missions, the fighters were returning to the aircraft carrier. In this situation, landings were to occur with an interval of three-to-four minutes,” read the translation.
“The first fighter landed without incident.”

However, the second fighter snapped one of the arresting wires during landing with the hook eventually catching on reserve arresting cable, the report said.

With the deck fouled from the cable break, the third MiG – which was on approach closely behind the second fighter – was told to circle back into a holding pattern while the crew of Admiral Kuznetsov cleared the deck for the next landing.

“While in the holding area, both of the fighter’s engines shut down,” read the translation.
“A preliminary explanation is that they were no longer receiving fuel. ln such situations, a fighter falls like a rock, and the pilot has only one option — to eject.”

[...]

https://news.usni.org/2016/11/21/russians-b...engine-shutdown

A broken arresting wire and the delay in correcting the fault was the starting point of the event. The pilot was forced to eject after running out of fuel, because the command did not want to send the aircraft to an alternate landing site, hoping for a quick removal of the damage on the ship's deck. If it had landed at Hmeymim, and especially in Cyprus, then the incident would have had to be reported and be reprimanded, "- said the source.

lenta.ru hat noch ein paar Details zum Absturz der MiG-29KR der Kusnezow [übersetzt mit google translate und etwas manuellem Feintuning]:

Daraus hat man offenbar die eine oder andere Konsequenz gezogen. Nun scheint nämlich eine Großteil der Flugzeuge gleich direkt von Humaymim aus zu starten - oder es hat damit nichts zu tun und war von Anfang an so beabsichtigt

Hier klicken!

Contacted, Pubic Relations Officer, Tactical Air Command, TAC, Wing Commander Okon Bassey, who claimed ignorance of the incident, said he was away in Lagos for a training course. His assistant who simply identified himself as Gambo denied knowledge of the crash. He said: “It’s all rumours, many people have been calling and disturbing us concerning the issue but I can confirm to you that nothing happened.”

Russian MiG-29 Crash: More than Meets the Eye

Igor Sutyagin and Aaditya Dave
Commentary, 29 November 2016

The recent crash of a Russian MiG-29 fighter jet into the Mediterranean Sea may indicate serious issues with Russian equipment.

The Russian media has published numerous stories debating the reasons behind the crash on 13 November of the MiG-29KUBR fighter jet. The initial Russian ministry of defence announcement stated that the aircraft, belonging to the air wing of the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov – currently deployed in the Mediterranean to support Russian efforts in Syria – crashed into the sea during a training flight due to a technical malfunction. The crash is another example of Russian equipment malfunctioning, pointing to wider issues with the design of Russian weapons systems.

According to non-Russian sources, the plane – which was the third of a trio of aircraft returning from a reconnaissance mission over targets around the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo – was asked to delay landing and maintain a holding pattern after the second jet broke a cable of the carrier’s ‘Svetlana-2’ arrestor while landing, incapacitating it for the next aircraft. Russian reports on 21–23 November described the situation on the landing deck as ‘a complete mess’. What was supposed to be a period of three-to-four minutes between landings turned into a longer interval, during which the plane suffered a twin engine shutdown, forcing the pilot to eject, and causing the aircraft to plunge into the sea.

The Russian explanation of events seems to imply that the engines shut down because ‘they were no longer receiving fuel’. However, media reports stress that the jet ‘had absolutely no technical failures’ when it fell into the sea.

This raises questions about the actual sequence of events. First, the Russian suggestion that a lack of fuel was to blame for the crash is contradicted by other versions of the events. US intelligence sources (allegedly monitoring flights leaving the Russian carrier) reported that the jet turned away from the mission almost immediately after take-off. Initial official Russian reports also noted that ‘the aircraft has interrupted the training mission due to malfunction’, and specifically referred to an engine fault as the possible cause of the accident.

In addition, the pilot of the MiG that crashed, Colonel Igor Matkovskiy, apparently reported a sudden fault in his jet’s engines. Colonel Matkovskiy is the chief of combat training service for Northern Fleet aviation and has completed over 200 landings on the Admiral Kuznetsov, making him one of Russia’s most qualified carrier pilots.

Second, although the poor training standards in Russia’s naval aviation have been put forward as an explanation for the crash, the alleged incompetence of the carrier’s deck crew seems to be exaggerated. In past instances when the arrestor cable has broken they have reacted well.

For example, in September 2005, a Su-33 fighter was lost when the arrestor cable snapped as the aircraft was in the final stages of deceleration; nevertheless, the next plane landed in just under 15 minutes. Carrier landing safety control footage shows that all four cables were restored within that time.

Additionally, MiG-29 fighters take off without the use of afterburners, and the jet’s maximum flight duration exceeds three hours, which implies – in the case of a return attempt undertaken soon after take-off – that even a reduced fuel load would suffice to maintain a holding pattern until the crew, whatever their level of training, managed to restore the arrestor’s functionality.

MiG-29 fighters have experienced faults on other occasions during the current Middle East mission. In fact, another MiG-29 aboard Admiral Kuznetsov became non-operational due to a technical fault during the carrier’s transition to the Mediterranean. Previously, Russia had lost two other MiG-29s, on 23 June 2011 and 5 December 2014.

Furthermore, a 2016 report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India disclosed that the Indian Navy’s MiG-29K/KUB (the ‘R’ in the Russian fighters stands for ‘Russian’, to describe differences in avionics) suffered a high failure rate in the fighters’ FADEC (full authority digital electronic control) system, based on the Russian BARK electronic engine control unit. This led to the withdrawal of ‘40 engines (representing 62 per cent of 65 engines) ... due to design related defects/deficiencies’. The issue had serious flight safety implications, since in-flight engine defects had led to ten cases of single engine landings.

The Indian report also noted that the plane’s serviceability rates had ranged from 16% to 38% since the aircraft’s induction into Indian inventories from 2009/10, and until March 2015.

The Russian media’s current attempt to attribute the loss of the MiG-29 solely to the deck crew’s incompetence appears to be a face-saving measure aimed at diverting criticism away from the flaws in the Russian weapons systems being aggressively marketed on international markets.

Indeed, Russian aviation industry representatives expressed earlier this year the hope that India would purchase 20 more MiG-29 aircraft. However, with India – the only operator of the plane apart from Russia – facing difficulties with its existing aircraft, and with evidence emerging from the 13 November accident that it was at least partly caused by engine malfunction, potential customers may well wonder whether this represents a more systemic technical failure.

Worryingly for the Russian military aviation industry, its other pitch to the international markets, the MiG-35 land-based multirole fighter, is also based on the MiG-29KUBR, and it has already lost out on tenders in both India and Egypt. And, needless to say, the reputational damage the industry is experiencing owing to apparent flaws in its basic design capabilities is obstructing the Kremlin’s progress in using arms sales to expand its international influence.

Aaditya Dave is a Research Assistant at RUSI.

Dr Igor Sutyagin is a Senior Research Fellow at RUSI.

"Wenige Minuten nach dem Start in Baikonur ist ein russisches Progress-Raumschiff auf dem Weg zur ISS explodiert. Hungern müssen die Astronauten auf der Station deshalb aber nicht. "
golem.de

Russian Su-33 crashed in the Mediterranean while attempting to land on Kuznetsov aircraft carrier

Dec 05 2016
By David Cenciotti

Less than three weeks after losing a MiG-29, it looks like the Russian Navy has lost another aircraft during Admiral Kuznetsov operations: a Su-33 Flanker.

Military sources close to The Aviationist report that a Russian Navy Su-33 Flanker carrier-based multirole aircraft has crashed during flight operations from Admiral Kuznetsov on Saturday, Dec. 3.

According to the report, the combat plane crashed at its second attempt to land on the aircraft carrier in good weather conditions (visibility +10 kilometers, Sea State 4, wind at 12 knots): it seems that it missed the wires and failed to go around falling short of the bow of the warship.

The pilot successfully ejected and was picked up by a Russian Navy search and rescue helicopter.

Considered that on Nov. 14 a MiG-29K crashed while recovering to the aircraft carrier, if confirmed this would be the second loss for the air wing embarked on Admiral Kuznetsov in less than three weeks and a significant blow for the Russian Naval Aviation during its combat deployment off Syria.

Die Russen sollten ihren Kusi-Einsatz am besten leise herunterfahren. Wenn das so weiter geht, dann werden sie Flugzeuge für die Marine nachbestellen müssen. Schon bemerkenswert, dass trotz gleich zwei Trainingseinrichtungen für den Trägereinsatz (Krim und Jejsk) es dennoch zu einer solchen Anhäufung von Fehlern kommt.

Pilot dies after warplane crashes in east-central Jordan
Mon Dec 5, 2016 4:8PM
A military source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the military aircraft was flying over Azraq town, located 100 kilometers east of the capital Amman, on Monday, when it experienced a technical glitch and crashed.
The slain pilot was later identified as Major Ayed Ahmad al-De'ajah.
http://presstv.com/Detail/2016/12/05/49658...raq-pilot-death

Ich finde da nichts bemerkenswert, es war eher erwartbar. Angesichts der mangelnden Übung und Erfahrung mit Trägeroperationen in der russischen Marine allgemein, sowie insbesonderen der schwierigen Ausbildungslage bei qualifizierten Trägerpiloten. Trägeroperationen gehören mit zum gefährlichsten Geschäft einer Marine, und das unter Normalbedingungen. Wer glaubt ein paar Simulatorflüge können einen echten Erfahrungsschatz an langjährigen realworld-Einsätzen auch nur ansatzweise aufwiegen wurde jetzt schmerzlich eines Besseren belehrt. Ich frage mich, ob die hohen Marineoffiziere auch auf diese Gefahren im vorhinein hingewiesen haben, man sich aufgrund der erhoften Propagandawirkung aber politisch entschlossen hat das trotzdem durchzuwinken. Wie auch immer, jetzt steht man ziemlich dumm da.

Wenn man nichts tut, wird man auch keine Erfahrung sammeln. Daher war die Entscheidung, den Träger endlich mal aus dem Hafen zu vertreiben durchaus richtig. Der Fehler lag dain, daraus gleich einen Kriegseinsatz zu machen, diesen in nur wenigen Wochen überhastet vorzubereiten und auf einen neuen Mix der Trägerflugzeuge umzuschwenken, den man zuvor in seiner Komplexität noch gar nicht erprobt hatte.

Wenn man nichts tut, wird man auch keine Erfahrung sammeln. Daher war die Entscheidung, den Träger endlich mal aus dem Hafen zu vertreiben durchaus richtig. Der Fehler lag dain, daraus gleich einen Kriegseinsatz zu machen, diesen in nur wenigen Wochen überhastet vorzubereiten und auf einen neuen Mix der Trägerflugzeuge umzuschwenken, den man zuvor in seiner Komplexität noch gar nicht erprobt hatte.

Die MiG soll aufgrund der höheren Landegeschwindigkeit die Fangseile wesentlich schneller abnutzen. Bei dem ersten Unfall sollen sich so auch mehrere Fangseile in einer Weise miteinander verwickelt haben, was man, entgegen der Routine in einem solchen Fall, nicht mehr so schnell lösen konnte.

he Russian Navy's only heavy aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov, part of the Northern Fleet, will start a far-away deployment this fall, a source familiar with the situation told Interfax-AVN on Monday.

"The dates when the cruiser will begin its far-away deployment are determined both by the volume of the work needed to restore its technical readiness and pilot training time," the source said.

"There are some problems with ship repair," he said.

Several media outlets said earlier that the Admiral Kuznetsov will begin the far-away deployment this summer.

"At any rate, the far-away deployment of the Admiral Kuznetsov is being planned," the source said without specifying its duration and purpose.

The source doubted the feasibility of plans "to put on the carrier two carrier-based aviation regiments, N279 and N100, by the beginning of this deployment."

"The pilots of the recently formed 100th separate carrier-based fighter aircraft regiment have just started flying from the airfield of the 859th tactical deployment center and retraining Naval Aviation pilots in Eisk on new Mikoyan MiG-29KR and MiG-29KUBR aircraft.

"Given that the ground training simulator NITKA [for pilots] in Eisk will be ready by the end of the year, and extension of its service and conducting of necessary repairs on its counterpart in Saky [Republic of Crimea] will, at best, take two months, the pilots of this regiment are unlikely to be able to complete all necessary preparatory procedures in time for the ship's deployment," he said.

"They missed out, because the training of pilots on MiGs could have been started a year ago on NITKA simulators in Saky," the source said.

The 279th separate carrier-based fighter aircraft regiment is armed with Sukhoi Su-33 and Su-25YTG aircraft.

The source, however, said he doubted that pilots of the 100th regiment, currently in Yeysk, Krasnodar territory, where another NITKA center has been built, would have enough time to prepare for the deployment. Officials said that the regiment could be ready for flights only by the end of the year.
[...]
It was reported that in 2014 and 2015 the NITKA center in Crimea was used to train ship-based aircraft pilots. However, the ship-based airplanes simulated simplified landings, in other words landings without catching the cable. Aircraft arresting gear will be allowed to function for a certain number of cycles during flights of Northern Fleet Air Force pilots this year.

Bisher habe ich nur Bilder der MiG-29KUBR auf der Kuznetsov gesehen. Daher gehe ich davon aus, dass die MiG-29K immer noch nicht wirklich ihre Einsatzreife auf der Kuznetsov erreicht hat und sie eigentlich auf Ausbildungsfahrt sind.

Naja, die Russen geben sich immer als harte Männer und so, dann werden die mit den Unfällen wohl auch leben können...

Die Ausbildungseinrichtung auf der Krim ist doch seit dem Ende der UDSSR doch außer Betrieb, oder täusche ich mich? Oder wurde sie inzwischen wieder in Betrieb genommen?

Die Ausbildungseinrichtung auf der Krim ist doch seit dem Ende der UDSSR doch außer Betrieb, oder täusche ich mich? Oder wurde sie inzwischen wieder in Betrieb genommen?

Yet another U.S. F/A-18 has just crashed in Japan. It’s the 9th Legacy Hornet lost in 6 months and the crash rate is alarming.
Dec 07 2016 - 2 Comments
By David Cenciotti
An F/A-18 Hornet stationed in Japan has crashed in the Yamaguchi prefecture. The pilot has ejected but his fate is unknown.

Reports are emerging that a U.S. F/A-18 Hornet has crashed earlier today in Japan. Rescue efforts to recover the pilot would be underway.

Although no further details are available at this time, the fact that the aircraft was stationed at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan, seems to suggest the jet involved in the crash was a U.S. Marine Corps F/A-18C/D model.

If confirmed this would be the 9th major incident involving a “Legacy Hornet” (including the Canadian CF-18 lost on Nov. 28, 2016) in the last 6 months.

Although each crash has its own root causes and may depend on several contributing factor (including the human error), we can’t but observe, once again, that the rate of crashes involving legacy Hornets is alarming.

Two U.S. Marine Corps F-18 Hornets from MCAS Miramar crashed on Nov. 9 near San Diego. Another one on Oct. 25. A Swiss Air Force Hornet was lost on Aug. 29, whereas a Navy F/A-18C crashed on Aug. 2. On Jul. 27 USMC F/A-18 crashed so as the Blue Angels Hornet that crashed on Jun. 2.
[...]