Passenger Flight From GITMO Slides Off Runway "I think it is a miracle," Connor said. "We could be talking about a different story this evening." https://www.foxnews.com/us/no-deaths-as-plane-carrying-us-military-crashes-into-river Coming back from GITMO.     DS Message? Instrument Failure?   Possible currupted China Chip? Lots of questions! "We came down, the plane literally hit the ground and bounced. It was clear the pilot did not have total control of the plane. It bounced again," she said, adding that the experience was "terrifying."  Q 1971 You didn't think military planes were falling out of the skies all within a short period of time just by chance did you? Outside of the standard deviation?  Q P-8A Poseidon Multimission Maritime Aircraft (MMA) The P-8A is a militarized 737, based on the fuselage of the 737-800 fitted to the wing and landing gear of the 737-900ER. It is clearly a weapon system, with a weapons bay in the fuselage for homing torpedoes and depth charges; four underwing pylons for Harpoon antiship missiles or other stores; and a rotary dispenser for up to 126 sonar buoys ("sonobuoys"), or stores designed to the sonobuoy form factor.  The primary combat avionics sensor is the Raytheon AN/APY-10 radar system, installed in the nose. The AN/APY-10 is a multimode search radar, with a "synthetic aperture radar (SAR)" capability for detection, imaging, classification, and identification of large or stationary vessels or for ground surveillance. The radar also features an "inverse SAR (ISAR)" capability to characterize small or fast moving vessels; has wide-area and high-resolution "spotlight" modes; and possesses passive signals intelligence (SIGINT) capabilities, allowing it to detect, characterize, and locate a wide range of radio or radar "emitters". In addition, the P-8A carries a Wescam electro-optical / infrared camera turret for visual inspection of targets.   Other avionics include a GPS / inertial navigation system unit; a suite of communications gear for voice and datalink using direct transmission or satcom relay; and a self-defense suite, including a radar warning system, a heat-seeking missile dazzler, and towed decoys to divert radar-guided missiles. Crew includes pilot and copilot, plus five or six mission crew.   * Two static-test prototypes and three flight prototypes were ordered at the outset, the first making its initial flight on 25 April 2009. Three more flight prototypes were ordered later. Introduction to operational service was declared on 1 July 2013, with operational flights taking place before the end of the year.   Orion crews are glad to get their hands on the Poseidon, not least because it's a nicer ride: the Orion tends to fly rough, while the P-8A has the smooth quiet flight of a jetliner, an important consideration when flying long and exhausting patrols. Cockpit crew like the glass cockpit, though they say it doesn't really make life much easier for them, because the Poseidon has more functional capability than the Orion -- like running faster to stay in the same place. Fuel burn of the P-8A is poorer than that of the P-3C down low, but the fact that the P-8A can get to station faster compensates for that drawback; the P-8A has a higher ceiling, giving a bigger patrol "footprint". Landing roll is somewhat longer, the P-8A's thrust reversers not being as effective as the P-3C's reversible props.   The "tactical coordinators (TACCOs)" also like the aircraft's "Mission Computing & Display System (MCDS)", which allows them to display overlaid data from the aircraft's sensors and remote datalinked systems on the twin 61-centimeter (24 inch) displays of each TACCO workstation. The MCDS provides an annotated view of the battlespace, integrating inputs from up to 64 sonobuoys along with radar and video. The system includes a reference library to provide useful information on identified targets, as well as a stores menu to allow the TACCOs to select stores for deployment or launch. The TACCOs also will be able to communicate with other platforms over secure comlinks, including access to and control over unmanned aerial vehicles.  The P-8A is designed with upgrades in mind. Software will be updated every two to three years; to support new hardware, the aircraft provides 50% more power and cooling capability than needed at the outset and can handle almost 11 tonnes (12 tons) more payload. A new radar is in the works -- see below -- as well as high-tech stores:   The Boeing "High-Altitude Anti-Submarine Warfare Weapon Capability (HAAWC)", glide torpedo, which is a Mark 54 homing torpedo, fitted to a switchblade airframe derived from that Boeing developed for the Small Diameter Bomb GPS-guided weapon. HAAWC will allow the Poseidon to perform attacks on adversary submarines from high altitude and long stand-off distance, with the switchblade airframe delivering the torpedo to the vicinity of the target, then deploying it with a parachute.  An expendable drone that would be launched out of a sonobuoy tube, to deploy wings and fly low to a target area to give it a close-up inspection with an imager and magnetic anomaly detector. There are also investigations for a larger drone that could be launched from the weapons bay.   HAAWC is on track for deployment, though the expendable drone program still experimental. The rationale for these two stores is that they would reduce the transit time and fuel burn required for the P-8 to descend and then return to cruise altitude. This is not only more economical in terms of fuel, it also means less stress on the airframe, and a longer service life.   In 2009, the P-8A was also selected by the Indian Navy as the "P-8I", with India to acquire eight machines, the first being delivered in late 2012, the last in 2015. Four more were ordered in 2016. They are much the same as the US Navy P-8As, though with some Indian avionics factored in; they were also delivered without secure communications and electronic warfare systems, India not having signed the proper security paperwork at the time. India is also obtaining the Harpoon anti-ship missile and US torpedoes to arm their P-8Is. India was a high-profile sale for Boeing, since traditionally India has bought little military hardware from the USA.   Australia confirmed an order for eight P-8As in 2014, towards a total order of 15, with initial delivery in 2016. The UK ordered nine in late 2015, with initial deliveries in 2020. Norway ordered five in 2017, to be delivered in 2021:2022. Boeing expects more foreign sales of the type, particularly from nations that have been traditional users of the P-3 Orion.   * The US Navy received its 50th P-8A at the beginning of 2017, with the last of the order to be delivered in 2019. An inflight refueling capability, using boom refueling, will be introduced into service late in 2017 or in 2018.   Work is underway for an "Increment 2" upgrade to the P-8A, planned to be introduced before the end of this decade. The heart of the upgrade is the Raytheon "Advanced Airborne Sensor (AAS)", an active array radar system derived from the AN/APS-149 Littoral Surveillance Radar (LSRS) carried on some Navy P-3C Orions, and featuring a range of sophisticated surface surveillance modes. The AAS will be fitted in a long ventral canoe; it turns out that the selection of the 737-800 as the basis for the Poseidon was driven by the length of the canoe. Increment 2 is being followed by an "Increment 3", which appears to be focused on an enhanced, reconfigurable battle management system, with introduction in 2020.  Boeing has been making broad comments about a "Medium-Sized Maritime Surveillance Aircraft" based on the P-8A, presumably based on a smaller 737 variant with a subset of the P-8A's capability. The USN has also been searching for a replacement for their airborne electronic intelligence (ELINT) platform, the EP-3E Aries, much like the P-3C except for payload. This requirement has proven even more difficult to deal with, and in fact at the present time no competition has been initiated to obtain the Aries replacement. Boeing has come up with notional designs for the "EP-X", based like the P-8A on the Boeing 737. Boeing envisions the EP-X as carrying 14 operator stations and an advanced active-array radar system.   Ideas are being floated for modular payloads that could be swapped out to tailor the EP-X to different missions. For the time being, the EP-X is going nowhere -- but Boeing is also pushing the 737 as a replacement for the Air Force's 707-based E-8 "Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (Joint STARS)" battlefield surveillance platform. The 737-700 variant would be used as the basis for the Joint STARS replacement. A downselect for for the Joint STARS replacement will take place in late 2017.   Incidentally, when news of China's conversions of 737s to missile tracking platforms broke, there was some fussing in the defense blogosphere about the negligence of the USA in allowing China to use an American jetliner for military purposes, and for the fact that these Chinese special-mission platforms were in service so much more quickly than the P-8A.   It was a tempest in a teacup. The US government has little control over old jetliners sold on the international market, and comparing the Chinese conversions to the P-8A was like comparing a car given an updated sound system to one converted into an armored battle wagon. The conversions were no more challenging than that applied to the NT-43A; the Chinese could have used a wide range of older aircraft, it was just a question of installing special-purpose kit in some airframe that could truck it around. The P-8A, in contrast, is an optimized weapon system integrating a suite of sensors, armament, communications gear, and self-defense systems. Whatever problems have afflicted the P-8A program, it's in a different league.