What ever happened to Flying Aircraft Carriers?

thanks to Star Trek Fleet command for sponsoring this video in 1983 the Soviets shot down a 747 carrying 269 people men women and children their excuse that it was an American Top Secret Spike Lane an unforgivable horrible mistake but as it turns out the Americans were planning to turn a 747 into just that a top secret weapon of mass destruction high above lies an insane new aircraft what looked like a simple Boeing 747 is quickly revealed to be so much more 10 small parasite fighter interceptors launched from the bays and fly forward engaging the enemy aircraft and securing the local airspace starting the new age of the flying aircraft carrier Airborne aircraft carriers would allow fighter jet sorties to get into the action in one third of the time of a battle group carry more Firepower than a ground-based Fighter Squadron and be used for everything from bomber defense deep strike attacks or interception against Soviet bombers it was such a revolutionary concept that the Air Force predicted that it would make a sea-based aircraft carriers obsolete by the year 2000 but what you might not know is the the 747 concept isn't the only design both Lockheed and Boeing were given the impossible challenge to make a Mothership aircraft and design and Advance fighter jet that could go toe-to-do with a Russian's best and keep the entire project top secret but only one Builder could be successful this is the incredible tale to build the world's most insane weapon the fly aircraft carrier in the fall of 1973 the U.S government commissioned an impressive study called investigation of a micro fighter slash Airborne aircraft carrier concept and boy this is a long and detailed document with strategies plans for operation alternative nuclear-powered prototypes and a heck of a lot more the study had three main objectives decide on the carrier craft from either Boeing or Lockheed choose the parasite aircraft that would go inside of them and show how the Airborne aircraft carrier could be used in Europe the Middle East and the Indian Ocean the first choosing the actual carrier aircraft was harder than you might think thanks to today's video sponsor Star Trek Fleet command in this awesome free game that's on iOS Android and Windows you get to engage in a story driven Star Trek Galaxy with your own Fleet of starships and iconic characters they have everyone from all the franchises from Spock to data to Michael Burnham explore the entire Star Trek universe with real-time combat and Mysteries that only you can solve and it gets better with Deep Space Nine is finally coming to Star Trek Fleet command this new arc will offer something for everyone with three new offices focused on ship survivability New Missions and introducing Alliance star bases players within an alliance will be able to now work together to build a star base control resources and receive Buffs for their Alliance we also have all the deep space crew in this version including Miles O'Brien who perhaps you'll finally be able to save from suffering so if this is right up your alley and you want to customize your dream crew of iconic characters and have Starships with unique powers to make you stand out as the strongest in the Galaxy then click that link in the description or scan that QR code you're not only getting a fun free game that's on Windows IOS and Android but you're also supporting the channel and letting me keep making animations that you love just like this one make it so audience flying aircraft carriers were not A New Concept At All by the 1970s with the US military having proposed such designs before using airships and biplanes flying underneath such as the macron and Akron they did hold up to five Curtis p9cs's each and did successfully launch and recover them but the US Navy found that weather can conditions would render the Airship useless losing both airships with fatalities in such circumstances five o'clock yesterday afternoon we had we had such destroyed control of the Airship and the ruptured gas out of we lost currency rapidly and we were unable to gain control and had to descendant upon the sea as airships themselves were phased out you know hinderberg and all that the idea was abandoned that was until the Russians started building flying carriers during World War II they converted a Soviet bomber the tb3 into a Mothership that could launch Five fighter aircraft America being America realized that the carrier race had begun with the Soviets and restarted their program they chose the convert 836 as a base aircraft as it was a powerful bomber it would have a excellent carrying capacity to carry fighter jets as an escort but whilst the B-36 carrier was an easy Choice the parasite aircraft was harder to figure out they concluded that they would need to redesign a plane from the ground up and the McDonald xf-85 was the result called affectionately the goblin this microfighter would be the perfect escort plane for the B-36 as it did the bombing missions all over the world alas was the xf-85 performed well in tests they never got them to work together with the mothership aircraft the reason was the way that the carrier would recover its mini Fighters after a mission takeoff was fine but when the pilots returned back to the bombing plane they would have difficulty navigating the slipstream and hitting the tiny Target on the landing trapeze factor in how tired the pilots would be after a combat Mission at 20 000 feet and you could see how this idea was a hard nugget to crack at the same time they also tried Wing docking Two fighters would join the bomber on each wing tip and fly in tandem alas this concept ended in tragedy an f-84 docked onto the b-29s left wingtip and the pilot activated its automatic control system to connect them instantly the aircraft flipped over onto the b-29's wing causing both aircraft to crash the f-84 pilots was killed instantly as was the entire crew of the B-29 when it hit the ground docking was to blame and it ended the program yet again so now we've reached the 1970s and what had changed so suddenly to make this carrier concept work again that my friends is in-flight refueling with the Air Force having plenty of practice with Docking fighter jets and bombers to tankers in the 70s why not do the extra step and use the same boom arm to pull the fighter plane inside of the mothership aircraft the advantage of this technique would be that Pilots wouldn't require any additional training they would just fly in formation and could be carried inside with no complex piloting necessary it would finally be easy to launch and recover Fighters at first the Boeing 707 was selected for its existing use as a refueling aircraft but then the military brass thought what if we went a little bigger and thus the study concluded that it was now possible to build this carrier and started a competition between two Mega Rivals to build it a showdown between the Boeing 747 and the Lockheed C5 Galaxy the race was on to build the Airborne aircraft carrier so why did the study decide between the Boeing 747 and the Lockheed C5 Galaxy for one both aircraft were new enough to the market that the production of a military prototype or a series run as an Airborne aircraft carrier wouldn't be at risk of the production itself shutting down like with the B-36 in fact the military believed that these aircraft would operate well off into the far-off year of 2000 and Beyond where they would then have built a custom probably nuclear-powered flying aircraft carrier for the role but I'll get on to that later so don't skip ahead you naughty Nelly in addition both carrier Concepts were big enough and had the range requirements needed to carry parasite fighter jets that were also under development the Pentagon gave Lockheed and Boeing the following aircraft requirements a dual launch and Recovery Bays for up to 10 Fighters in-flight refueling Booms for initial contact and refueling Heist speed fighter launch and recovery and carrier versatility to operate in alternative roles such as a Cargo Carrier Troop Carrier or a tanker you know just in case it wasn't launching planes Lockheed came up with some novel solutions to make the C5 Galaxy work and today we can even see the 1968 patents for some of their ideas first was the boom utilizing the same area as the cargo wrap the C5 would have been able to grab the parasite fighters in flight and rotate them upwards to join the conveyor attached to the ceiling it would then bring them into the hangar area which would be depressurized moving over to a scissor switch that would allow recovery and deployment in a quick series the system would have little powered carriages that would be able to move their parasite aircraft to different stations where needed such as refueling re-armament or Pilot recovery the onboard aircraft would have been stacked side by side with wings folded and they would have been lowered onto special platforms to be refueled re-armed and sent back out on Mission interestingly the patent also covers drone aircraft so even in 90 1968 they were already anticipating that these aircraft would be tireless someday in the future and a side note on these patents they've actually expired back in 2014 so if you have a C5 Galaxy there's nothing stopping you copying and using this system at first the C5 Galaxy fit the bill and was more easy to modify than the Boeing 747 not requiring any additional openings on boards such as a mid fuselage door but further investigations found that it would be difficult for it to also carry a cargo on board negating its Mission flexibility but that would only be the tip of the iceberg with the problems with the C5 that cargo door that looks so favorable it couldn't actually be fully open in flight at speed plus the way that the C5 was designed it actually had critical balance conditions to ensure a level flight heavy objects like fighter jets had to be in the center of of gravity and couldn't be moved around in Flight kinda negating the entire point of a flying aircraft carrier the report wrote off the concept that the c5a lacked the endurance for multiple sorties for each fighter there wasn't enough room for a pilot's accommodation or rest areas not enough room for missiles and ammo and definitely not enough fuel to refuel the parasite Fighters multiple times the Boeing 747 concept seemed like a dream in comparison it simply needed to be able to carry more weight and add in a new door these considerations led to the selection as the 747 freighter as the Baseline for further studies and with the carrier selected it was time to look for a fighter jet that would fit but that's 17.5 foot wingspan limitation of the 747 made it almost impossible it looked like that they would need to build a whole new parasite fighter so far Boeing had one win over Lockheed but the contest between the two was still very much alive for the parasite fighter this new tiny Cutting Edge fighter would be required to be able to go toe-to-toe with the mig-21 an aircraft that was readily available to the Soviets in the ussr's Allies around the world a tall order for sure for an aircraft that would need to be significantly smaller and lighter again Lockheed was the first to present their concept now as all of this took place a long time ago the details about their micro fighter designs have been somewhat lost to history but we know that Lockheed presented a parasite variant of the f-104 Starfighter as a possible Contender called the cl307 it would lack a landing gear before narrower to fit on board the mothership plane and it would have also had a really long nose where it would have stored its weapon systems a forward Bombay if it were but ironically the size specifications were initially limited due to the C5 Galaxy cargo door but when they failed to secure the contract for the mothership and the fact that that door couldn't actually be fully open in Flight the limitation was abandoned allowing Boeing to come flying in initially Boeing had five different micro fighter designs under consideration with different aeronautical attributes to ensure the best Mission profile but one design stood out meet Boeing's winner the incredible model 908 625 or dubbed the Advanced Micro fighter right away you can see that this aircraft is a special design small enough to fit on board the 747 it had no tail with highly swept Wings ending at a large tip fins for all a total length of 29 feet which is super small for a fighter jet the cockpit section was modeled after the F-16 Falcon but with the f-104 Starfighter Inlet and a Cutting Edge for the time a rectangular 2D vectoring nozzle so this little bad boy could do some serious moves out maneuvering its adversary the mig-21 it also had a really odd side opening cockpit hatch after all the door couldn't open upwards due to the space restrictions a rare feature in the US military it would also be equipped with two A9 air-to-air missiles and two machine guns with 235 rounds each there was also an option to include a 25 millimeter cannon with 300 rounds that was hydraulically powered and a small smart bomb attached to the wing route for the rare bombing raids that it could perform while not a ton of warheads compared to say the F-16 you have to remember that the jet could quickly return to the mother ship to reload as the jet itself didn't actually land at airports it didn't have a landing gear the play was supposed to be launched in land exclusively via the mothership and could not be capable of taking off from the ground but in an emergency situation it could deploy some metal skis that would allow it to come to a rest on a flat surface there was also a torque of an inflatable ski system but the technology was science fiction back then and looking at the fighter you can see just how cramped the single engine would make the cockpit leaning back in Flight up to 50 degrees the pilot would have barely any room it would certainly feel like that they were strapped to a rocket the side note there is evidence to suggest that Boeing also pitched this design to the Navy as a carrier-based hoverable veto microfighter although still missing the landing gear so likely it would have landed on some special ship based platform just like The Nutcracker design that we have shown here on the channel so if you haven't subscribed already Now's the Time Boeing also did some further development work on a few different variants of the microfighter such as a bomber reconnaissance as well as a supersonic variant yes that's a micro supersonic fighter Interceptor yes this one was called the inspiring name of model 985213 and it was intended to be operational by 1985 as the second generation in parasitic fighter which is impressive that Boeing was already planning that it was very similar to the previous version but was stretched to 44 feet but as it was longer only six would be able to operate on board the 747 carrier but Engineers believe that the speed would make up for any lack in quantity this supersonic version would also have a landing gear unlike the skis of the other micro fighters and carry two air-to-air missiles on top of the Wings which was rare for the time with the 747 carrier ready to be built and the parasite Fighters undergoing wind tunnel tests it was time to figure out how it would all work on board the 747 launching refueling and re-arming a fighter jet let alone in Flight would possibly be the most difficult and complex operation ever to plan there would have to be two sections on board the aircraft to launch and another to recover the parasite Fighters One to the forward and one to the rear of the fuselage respectively the reason for two bays as opposed to the C5 Galaxy design which had a single rear bay door was in case a damaged microfighter would block a Bayon recovery in this version the 747 could still operate with a bay blocked each door would be manned by a crew member in more on the crew in a minute who would telescope out and capture the microfighter with the refueling boom arm to clarify the arm would go out not the crew member although a little arm with a pod on it like a de-icing machine would be hilarious once the boom was connected the fighter jet could be refueled in around 30 seconds if they wanted to depart and keep escorting the carrier or the jet could be brought inside in this case the micro jet would be dragged in forwards and upwards into a trapeze operated by a crew member with a unique role it would then be secured and locked into internal conveyor and disconnected from the boom which could then be used to capture or refuel another Fighter the original microjet would then be moved into the pressurized airlock before moving into the main hangar Bay that's right the main hangar Bay of the 747 would have been pressurized to ensure easy access for crew members and maintenance of the aircraft by the support crew a so-called t-shirt Zone to Aid the crew in servicing these Jets there would be a rail mounted Carriage that could bring spare parts and new missiles to quickly restock the Jets this system would allow the crew to refuel re-arm and relaunch a jet every 10 minutes and even less if the aircraft did away with the pressurized airlocks each of the Microfighters would operate up to 2 hours and 40 minutes on their own and have three refueling Cycles giving the 747 aircraft carrier an operational time of 8 hours when in actual operation the 747 could launch an aircraft every 80 Seconds which is an important number because of a Mach 3 enemy plane was detected by its AAC the 747 would only have one and a half minutes to launch a defensive fighter before itself could be shot down when not in use or when the Boeing 747 was in stealth mode the Microfighters were stored in a space efficient configuration with the piled nose on top of one another the hump of the 747 would also house the crew rest areas Logistics and command stationed for operations and there would be room for some Cargo in the rear tail of the plane the there would also be a special Recon room used to develop photographs taken from two Microfighters fitted with high def spy cameras oh did I not mention that they plan to use the carrier to launch spy missions yet of course this plane really could do it all as each of these flying aircrafts would be partnered with an a-wax aircraft which would actually handle the mission command it was felt that the carrier was best suited to just focus on turning around its fighter elements and leave the actual Battlefield situation to the a-wax companion on board there would be 44 crew members 12-2 launch and recover the fighters in a pressurized learning Bay 12 fighter pilots and 18 support crew members including the 747s actual crew members to keep the whole apparatus flying and freedom delivering the Boeing 747 aircraft carrier had a very unique Mission and as such the 1973 report outlined three possible situations where it could be used not specific missions but more varied situations to give a good example of the technology they were Ally defense continuous air defense and first strikes [Music] the first was a proposed attack by Soviet linked forces on the American Ally of Israel in this scenario the Boeing 747 Mothership would have departed England well out of range of Soviet radar and moved into operation around Cyprus it's here that they would have deployed its parasite fighters who would have moved with the aircraft to Striking Distance they would have come to the rapid defense of Israel well before a carrier Fleet could arrive offshore and help achieve air superiority the 747 Mothership would have idled just off the coastline as its Fighters entered Syria and Iraq alternatively if Britain wasn't so forthcoming with stationing weaponized 747s there was also an option to base the aircraft in the Indian Ocean to protect shipping lanes on the U.S base of Diego Garcia from this location the 747 could fly 600 nautical miles to the Horn of Africa to deploy fighters to rescue ships or strike Soviet targets again this was particularly useful as the 747 was significantly faster than Naval vessels and could meet a threat in hundreds of minutes rather than hundreds of hours the last scenario outlined what was a continuous aerial defense of Europe multiple Airborne aircraft carriers would travel in a series one after another 325 nautical miles apart with an a-wax in tow able to create a border of 250 nautical miles any Soviet entry would be detected and met with Superior Firepower and how many flying aircraft carriers did they propose for this plan 10 plus 1 a wax meaning over a hundred fighter jets that could be in Europe from the United States within eight hours there was also the possibility to include a few refueling 707s as well in this Fleet to keep them all flying the sheer presence of this Airborne Attack Force would seriously put the Russians on notice it was also suggested that this wasn't just offensive but could be used offensive as well with a plan to deep strike into Russia targeting supply lines Depots military reserves and airfields which knowing the current situation in Ukraine with Russia makes it all a little too real the report also featured the feasibility future of the design that eventually by the 80s the US military would have perfected nuclear-powered aircraft carriers to replace the 747 or C5 Galaxy something like the Lockheed Super carrier a video which I've made here on the channel that you can watch today and believe me this idea was huge the report concluded that the next step would be the development of a prototype microfighter a ground-based prototype of the refueling and re-arming conveyor belt system and of course buying a 747 freighter and fitting it out for a first test flight but that never happened why was the Airborne aircraft carrier with all of its promise never built for one we can't ignore the fact that the single missile could hit the 747 aircraft carrier and take it out a whole battle group in one go as missile technology got better and better this kind of made this aircraft design more irrelevant and even though Microfighters were cheaper than their ground or navy counterparts once you factor in the cost of a 747 and an Airfield to launch it from you come back to roughly the same budget we also have to keep in mind that had the 747 concept being chosen it would have painted a Target on the back of every civilian 747 ever built now the Russians would actually think a simple Flight of the 747 would be an attack on their sovereignty something that had unfortunately happened before Korean Airlines flight 007 was shot down after leaving Alaska during the Cold War in 1983. the Russians claimed that the plane was operating a spy aircraft and did it strayed into the airspace of Russia where they killed all 269 passengers and crew a sobering thought for all of those people that championed the 747 design ultimately it was the lack of progress with developing the Microfighters that led to the end of the project despite attempts to make it all work it just made more sense to use bigger ground-based aircraft that could land and carry more weapons to do the job Boeing tried to spin the aircraft carrier concept as a possible spy plane with two Microfighters to be used for spy missions but like what we showed earlier the idea was shot down the air force that seemed moved onto other ideas or did they in 2015 it was revealed that the Air Force had resumed the search for an Airborne aircraft carrier thanks to the shrinking of aircraft technology by using drones and other small unpiloted aircraft it would never be possible to launch these craft from existing cargo planes like the C-130 these drones nicknamed Gremlins after the mythological tricksters of the air and the existing xf-85 would be equipped with customized payloads and turned loose on enemy defenses doing everything from intelligence collection to destroying radar sites and other ground targets they would be able to fly around 300 miles and have a small ornament of around 60 pounds as it wouldn't have a pilot it's possible for these drones to fly on suicide missions deep within Enemy Lines so you could imagine this cargo plane deploying them along a border and then they fly into God knows what so far the military or rather DARPA has awarded contracts to General atomics the creator of the famous predator drone to create a full-scale technology demonstrator essentially a new Airborne carrier drone The Next Step would to test these drones but flying them and recovering them with a C-130 transport and there's even talk of partnering them up with a wingman drone project and having F-22 Raptors control these drones once they're launch from the C-130 while not as exciting as our glamorous 747 aircraft carrier it's good to see that the totally insane project is not yet dead if you enjoyed this video I suggest you watch its twin on submarine aircraft carriers a deep dive into the sinking military air bases Under the Sea a special shout out to Scott from Aerospace projects review who helped research this project jump onto his side to see more information just like this video thanks for watching [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] [Music]

Channel: Found And Explained

Views: 1,617,316

Keywords: aircraft carrier, flying aircraft carrier, us aircraft carrier, aircraft carriers, future aircraft carrier, new aircraft carrier, type 003, us billions aircraft carrier, united states

Id: UfDxsfiDl24

Length: 30min 39sec (1839 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 11 2022