Nothing like an inadvertent ejection story to keep the workday moving along. (Thanks to aviation photographer Jose Ramos who shared this with us via Facebook.)

As the plane rolled into another stomach-churning manoeuvre, the passenger was probably wishing that he was somewhere else. Then, just like that, he was.

The man, a civilian joyriding with his air force pilot friend, accidentally grabbed the eject lever while trying to brace himself. He was instantly fired through the aircraft’s perspex canopy and blasted 320ft (100m) into the sky by the rocket-powered chair. He then floated down to the ground with a parachute that opened automatically.

Experts said he was lucky to escape unharmed from the bizarre accident last week in South Africa.

Read the rest of the story here.

DT readers may remember a similar incident involving a ship driver accidently punching out of a Tomcat over the ranges of Fallon a few years back. That one happened after the pilot rolled inverted as well. The pilot got to drive a convertable F-14 back to the field after his blackshoe passenger departed.

– Ward

The Pentagons top weapons analysts are reportedly arguing that the Navy does not face a fighter gap, something Boeing and various lawmakers have argued is a pressing problem the country must fix.

A congressional source tells us that apparently PA&E is convinced that there isnt actually a strike fighter shortfall, while the Navy is convinced theyll be 240-plus planes short of Naval strike fighters Were trying to figure out how PA&E can possibly come to this conclusion, but were not getting many answers.

Several senior OSD sources told me that PA&E is making this argument, based on a range of capabilities offered by the Air Force.

PA&Es contention is that we have excess Air Force strike fighter capacity, so the Navy shortfall doesnt affect us strategically But I dont think the Air Force can land their fighters on a carrier, our congressional source said wryly.

The fighter numbers were summarized recently in a study by the Congressional Research Services naval analyst, Ron ORourke. The Navy projects that a current strike-fighter shortfall of about 15 aircraft will grow to about 30 aircraft in FY2009, to more than 50 aircraft in FY2016, and to more than 90 aircraft in FY2017-FY2020, before declining to more than 50 aircraft in FY2021 and to roughly zero aircraft by FY2025. At its peak in FY2017, the Navy states, the Dept. of Navy projected strike-fighter shortfall will be 125 aircraft, of which 69 will be Navy strike-fighters, ORourke wrote.

[Since writing the above, I received the newest CRS analysis. It doubles the estimated shortfall. This is what the report, by Christopher Bolckum, says: “The Navy projects that if no additional action is taken, a DON strike-fighter shortfall of about 15 aircraft in FY2009, to 50 aircraft in FY2010, and to a peak of 243 aircraft in FY2018. The projected strike-fighter shortfall is hoped to decrease after FY2018, but the DON will still have a gap of over 50 strike fighters in 2025. At its peak in FY2018, the projected DON strike-fighter shortfall will be 129 Navy strike-fighters and 114 Marine Corps strike-fighters.

“This projected strike-fighter shortfall is twice as big as the Navys earlier projected shortfall of 125 aircraft. 9 (See Figure 1, below) The earlier estimate was the Navys, most optimistic projection because it assumed, among other things, that the service lives of Hornets could be extended from the current planning figure of 8,000 flight hours to 10,000 flight hours.” You can read it here.]

Were trying to get more information from Boeing here at the Navy League conference.

Boeing has been making a valiant effort to convince the Pentagon and the public that the Navys fighter gap should be closed using F-18 E/Fs. These planes are cheaper than F-35s, are already available in production models and they meet the services current operational requirements, the company has argued.

– Colin Clark

EDITOR’S NOTE: We’re working to get more details on the sniper shot on the pirates — what weapon, what range, what optics, what rounds and also some of the tactics…We’re narrowing in on the gouge but need to get it confirmed. Will post as soon as I get it and if anyone else out there has some info on it, please email me. I promise NO FINGERPRINTS.

Naval journalist Robert D. Kaplan had an op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times, “Anarchy on Land Means Piracy at Sea.” Kaplan states that the various ships the United States Navy now possesses are too big (heavy) and expensive to effectively carry out vital oceanic counterinsurgency efforts. While the safe rescue yesterday of the captain of M/V Maersk Alabama from Somali pirates holding him hostage in a lifeboat demolishes the central argument of Kaplan’s piece, his thesis does bear further scrutiny, and rebuttal.

Vital shipping lanes are being ravaged hundreds of miles from land by expendable mercenaries commanded by smart and ruthless pirate warlords. The swelling costs of containment patrols, defensive measures, and ransom payments impact the global economy. Dispatching the 9,400-ton Arleigh Burke destroyer USS Bainbridge plus two smaller escorts was cost-justified and militarily appropriate — in fact, was necessary.

Bainbridge is massive enough to carry two heavily armed Seahawk helos. Her deck cranes can launch speedboats with SEAL teams aboard, and in a pinch could deploy SEAL Delivery Vehicle underwater scooters. She can keep the sea in all weathers better than a smaller ship, and has longer on-station logistical staying power. She offers more adequate space for special mission communications and planning equipment and staff.

Bainbridge also sports powerful over the horizon surveillance systems and weaponry, able to track and engage many targets at once. She has sophisticated active sonar to search for hostile diesel subs, which become a real issue when the destroyer needs to dwell near one location for very long. She fields a broad spectrum of missiles plus state-of-the-art machine guns and cannon. She’s big enough and well manned enough to take repeated hits from rocket propelled grenades, and keep fighting.

The pirates had considerable further strength in this game beyond Kaplan’s “spectacle” of Maersk Alabama’s “tiny” lifeboat with its “handful” of men and a single captive. They’ve commandeered larger vessels they use as motherships, and are well supplied with RPGs. They were sending in several other captured foreign cargo vessels loaded with hostage crews, to use as human shields. These might have tried to surround, or fire upon, or even ram something less able to defend herself and her escorts than USS Bainbridge.

Kaplan himself refers to the danger that mercenary pirate methods could be adapted by suicidal terrorists. This argues in favor of larger on-scene vessels, not smaller ones, to provide the command connectivity, sensors, weaponry, endurance, and survivability required for the U.S. Navy to prevail in any such fight to the death.

– Joe Buff

Are we witnessing a new form of naval confrontation, with escalating numbers of vessels converging to one static spot on the ocean? One that doesn’t involve fast charging and fast shooting so much as a floating standoff? A striking common feature of the recent China vs. U.S. confrontation off Yulin Island about ambiguous peactime oceanic territorial privileges, and the tense standoff between U.S. Navy warships and Somali pirates holding cargo ships and crewmen hostage for sizeable ransom demands, is that temporarily everyone closes in — and then nobody moves.

In the non-lethal “Battle of Yulin,” Chinese patrol boats finally let the unarmed sonar survey ship USNS Impeccable leave the area when the guided missile destroyer USS Chung-Hoon drew near, intimidating the 5-boat Chinese swarm that surrounded Impeccable. In the case of the USS Bainbridge versus Maersk Alabama lifeboat rescue, which had seen pirate warlords trying to send in other captive ships and crews as human shields, it was unclear for several days what might happen next; dozens of lives were on the line with no easy way out.

This could be the emergence of a hybridization of unconventional warfare and soft-power conflict at sea. Unconventional warfare relies on asymmetric guerilla methods. Soft power is the art of influencing an adversary to achieve non-military goals (say, political or economic) by means short of blowing up something or someone.

This trend calls for a stronger, broader repertoire of USN and U.S. Coast Guard maneuver tactics and rules of engagement, equipment, training — and funding. It’s been suggested that from now on, unarmed USN surveillance ships inside China’s 200-mile EEZ might need armed escorts, which would put more operational strain on the Fleets providing and supporting such warships. On the anti-piracy front, do we need to go back to multinational convoying, again with armed escorts, as in the Persian Gulf Tanker War in the 1980s — despite how expensive for all involved this practice would be?

Putting more privatized commando teams aboard individual merchant ships, as is happening to some degree now, might not be enough. Skill at hostage negotiating has become directly relevant. Should every deployed warship carry such talent? Wise men have said that war is the conduct of politics by other means, and that all wars are basically economic struggles. Political, economic, and military concerns are intertwining here. For a nation with sizeable overseas trade like the United States wants to continue enjoying, economic success and robust seapower often tend to rise or fall together.

– Joe Buff

Think we’re going to hear a speech about this from our boy in Venezuela? Can you smell the sulfer here?

From Military.com:

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead announced today the re-establishment of the U.S. Fourth Fleet and assigned Rear Adm. Joseph D. Kernan, currently serving as commander, Naval Special Warfare Command, as its new commander. Fourth Fleet will be responsible for U.S. Navy ships, aircraft and submarines operating in the Caribbean, and Central and South America.

U.S. Fourth Fleet will be dual-hatted with the existing commander, U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command (NAVSO), currently located in Mayport, Fla. U.S. Fourth Fleet has been re-established to address the increased role of maritime forces in the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) area of operations, and to demonstrate U.S. commitment to regional partners.

“Re-establishing the Fourth Fleet recognizes the immense importance of maritime security in the southern part of the Western Hemisphere, and signals our support and interest in the civil and military maritime services in Central and South America,” said Roughead. “Our maritime strategy raises the importance of working with international partners as the basis for global maritime security. This change increases our emphasis in the region on employing naval forces to build confidence and trust among nations through collective maritime security efforts that focus on common threats and mutual interests. ”

Effective July 1, the command will have operational responsibility for U.S. Navy assets assigned from east and west coast fleets to operate in the SOUTHCOM area. As a result, U.S. Fourth Fleet will not involve an increase in forces assigned in Mayport, Fla. These assets will conduct varying missions including a range of contingency operations, counter narcoterrorism, and theater security cooperation (TSC) activities. TSC includes military-to-military interaction and bilateral training opportunities as well as humanitarian assistance and in-country partnerships.

U.S. Fourth Fleet will retain responsibility as NAVSO, the Navy component command for SOUTHCOM. Its mission is to direct U.S. naval forces operating in the Caribbean, and Central and South American regions and interact with partner nation navies to shape the maritime environment.

Kernan will be the first Navy SEAL to serve as a numbered fleet commander.

And it’s being honchoed by a SEAL?! Look out Citgo, we’re coming to get you…

– Christian

CUTLINE:ATLANTIC OCEAN (Nov. 6, 2007) — Rough seas pound the hull of Military Sealift Command fast combat support ship USNS Arctic (T-AOE as she sails alongside Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75) while preparing for a replenishment at sea. Truman is a part of Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 10 and is en route to the Central Command area of responsibility as part of the ongoing rotation to support maritime security operations in the region. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Joshua A. Moore

(Gouge: NC)

– Christian

Market Watch is reporting the following: “The Justice Department and the U.S. Navy have reached a settlement agreement with approximately 3,400 property owners in Virginia Beach and Chesapeake, Va., regarding litigation relating to jet noise at a naval air base. Under the terms of the agreement, the participating plaintiffs agree to dismiss their claims and acknowledge that the settlement does not constitute an admission of liability by the United States.

“‘We are pleased that the federal government and residents near the Naval Air Station Oceana and Naval Auxiliary Landing Field, Fentress have been able to reach an amicable resolution in this matter and avoid further litigation,’ said Matthew J. McKeown, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. ‘This resolution signals an end to six years of litigation and provides positive results for the citizens as well as the government.’

“The class-action lawsuit stems from the relocation of 156 Navy F/A-18 C/D Hornet fighter jets from Cecil Field, Fla., to Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach, Va., between December 1998 and July 1999. Plaintiffs own approximately 2,100 properties and alleged in a group of nine lawsuits filed between April 2001 and June 2005 that the introduction of the Hornets resulted in a substantial increase in overflights and jet noise. Under the settlement, the federal government will pay the plaintiffs an amount not to exceed $34.4 million.”

As one who flew out of NAS Oceana for more than 15 years (and who also owned property under the landing pattern) all I can say is “are you kidding me?” The base has been in place since 1943. This is nothing but an elaborate drug deal, the result of home builders in collusion with the Virginia Beach city council wantonly ignoring the existence of a “master jet base” in their midst. This is the same sort of activity that landed NAS Oceana back on the BRAC list for the next go ’round — a wreckless disregard for existing jet traffic (and known future requirements) in the face of money-making opportunities.

In the meantime pilot training has been affected by “noise abatement” rules that grow more restrictive with each rewrite until fighter pilots might as well be driving Boeing 777s. And now the tax payer takes it on the chin on the order of $34 million because of underhanded civic dealings and stupid homebuyers?

Ridiculous …

– Ward

Defense Industry Daily has an interesting series of snippets about the F-22 posted today, and the center of the controversy appears to pit old skool thinking against new.

The “Fighter Mafia” boys at the Center for Defense Information say the Raptor is a pig. According to the DID article “F-16 program analyst Pierre Sprey and author James Stevenson argued that the F-22’s fuel:weight ratio, wing loading, and acceleration are inferior to existing fighters. They contend that numbers, acceleration, fast changes in energy state, and a 360 degree cockpit view count for more in [dogfights].”

But Raptor driver Lt. Col. Wade Tolliver basically says concerns regarding maneuverability are moot when one considers the capabilities of a Fifth Generation fighter like the F-22: “It’s amazing the information you have at your fingertips.” He claims that in no-holds-barred mock battles with F-15s, F-16s and the Navy’s F/A-18 Hornets, he and other Raptor pilots generally “destroy” their adversaries before those foes even realize they’re around.

So who’s right? Are the days of “gettin’ in the phone booth” over? Or will aerodynamic performance and pilot skill still matter when all the high-techery goes kaput in the heat of battle?

– Ward

Of all the “homemade” Tomcat retrospectives I’ve seen, I consider this one the best. It really captures the essence of life in a carrier-based fighter squadron: Great shipmates, hot wives, strong families, and one hell of a kick-ass airplane.

Tomcats forever …

– Ward