Is the Falcon not a single engine capable bird??
You bet. If it loses an engine it can easily climb up and it has a great single-engine radius. In fact, it does better losing an engine than the C-144 in this respect. That is, if you are doing a mission way out 1200 mile away from land and you lose an engine on the C-144, you might have to dump quite a bit of fuel to continue flying if you are hot & heavy, and then you may not be able to limp all the way to shore.
Not only that, it makes little sense to me to get the Hoover when there are a variety of platforms out there that could easily be used for the same mission, like the HC-144 and HU-25. Many countries use executive jets/medium civil aircraft for CG and MARPAT duties. It makes little sense to me to use an older platform that would be cost intensive in the long run. The CG doesn't hunt subs and doesn't perform maritime strike, like other interested parties that have looked at the S-3, and they don't land on the carrier. So why does the CG really need the mighty War Hoover? To me, it just smacks of wishful thinking on the part of S-3 guys.......
It is my understanding that this would be just a stop gap measure as the C-144 comes (slowly) on line through missionization/testing. The reasons that the C-144 was chosen was it was cheap (it was during the initial bids, at least), and we are looking at contract maintenance. It is much cheaper to operate a prop than a jet and the loiter time is good (better than the Falcon's which is around 3.5 hours...less than an HH-60!), but it is still taking a while for it to move through.
I don't have all of the facts, but I can see someone at HQ saying "Admiral, we can lease these available aircraft with great radar/loiter/established record and we can have them on line in just xx months vice the X years we are looking at with the Casa. And look, here are hard numbers on the operating costs".
I would love to hear all of the reasoning on this one.
Taking an unbiased look at this is hard for me to do but the Hoov is definitely capable of handling the stress of the non0carrier environment for another 12,000 hours. It does not require R&D and the purchasing thing is not a factor since it is a government transfer of an asset to a different "department". Safety is also a factor....the S-3B is a single-engine capable airplane that can take a beating so it beats out the Falson in that respect. It is less of a "beast" than a Herc, and more maneuverable. The only thing that I would not want to see is the Hoov painted White and Orange.
NASA is operating 2 that I know of as icing research testbeds also.
