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Navy mine countermeasures helicopters
- Thread starter Llarry
- Start date
It’s been the beginning of the end for the 53 community for the last 15 years or so…
2023: HM-14 sunset
2025: HM-12 sunset
2027: HM-15 sunset
www.navytimes.com
2025: HM-12 sunset
2027: HM-15 sunset
US Navy declares its mine countermeasures suite ready for operations
The Navy declared its mine countermeasures mission package operational, ahead of a planned 2025 deployment on a littoral combat ship.
www.navytimes.com
FY18 NDAA had some strong stipulations about how/when Avenger and MH-53Es could be sundowned. Based on the schedule, I’m assuming those “alternative capabilities” are on track to meet the quantities required. But, if it has anything to do with LCS MCM, I’ll bet we’ll see that fall through.
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JoeBob1788
Well-Known Member
Navy Mine Warfare Teeters Between Present, Future
Navy Mine Warfare Teeters Between Present, Future
Also ceding it to MCM companies, which are a mix of EOD and UUV contractors. The capabilities of these platoons and companies is significant and only improving. I never did an MCM deployment, but we’ve all done exercises with UUVs and EOD MCM deploys with them. From my limited vantage point it would seem the Navy is investing more in UUVs than in aerial MCM. Makes sense… small, agile teams are a lot easier to deploy anywhere. The Knifefish or whatever they’re calling the UUVs these days are a heck of a mapping tool, and EOD divers doing disposal hasn’t changed.
I've heard that historically less than 50% of HM aircraft sorties/flight hours involved anti mine/counter measures training or operations and most real world impact was in pax and cargo. HM was in my mind a noble idea poorly executed aircraft designs. A bunch of Naval theorists hypothesised and sold the idea that a global short notice AMCM capability was strategic and proceeded to build an empire around the mission. When the nation truly needed a long range "from the sea" vertical lift capability, HM could not deliver. (Eagle Claw).
Putting Eagle Claw on HM is ridiculous.
hlg6016
A/C Wings Here
There was enough fingerpointing for all the shit that piled up on that mission. Outside of givind up their birds and sucking it up for the write offs I don't see much to blame on HM.
Highly recommend “The Guts to Try” if you are interested in understanding why Operation Eagle Claw failed. Decidedly an Air Force spin on the mission, but turns out when you rob several fleet squadrons of their MH-53Ds in the middle of the night, hand them to the Marines, stuff them below deck on a CVN (out of sight of those pesky satellites), and then expect the airframes to operate on call for a highly-complex mission bad things can and will happen..
While heavy lift/ PMC is always the secondary mission set for HM, there are several real-world examples of why the community continues to matter. Surface ships clear the water column (either mine hunting or mine sweeping) incredibly slowly whereas a 53 can tow at sometimes 2-3x the speed of the ship: on many an exercise in Bahrain that alone proved the aircraft’s worth to the MCMRON staff. From the outside looking in I get that a lot doesn’t necessarily make sense, but in most complex defense topics I think that’s often the case.
hlg6016
A/C Wings Here
A
I was not there but I had the opportunity to sit in on an informal brief by the ACE CO years later. The mission boiled down to too many things going bad that could not be made good.
And they did, Like any other mishap it was a combination of events that nobody anticipated. Removing the paticulate filters from the intakes worked fine in prior workups in Yuma making transit through the sandstorms an issue when the time came. Chiplights added to it. The busload if Iranian citizens and lighting up the gas truck on the highway added more to the camels load. Final straw was pure human error, bird coming into the FARP blinded the taxi director with it's downwash causing him to bolt to get out of the dust cloud he went under the tail of the bird without turning his taxi wands off vice going past the wingtip and the pilot understandably followed the wands. We know the rest of the story.
I was not there but I had the opportunity to sit in on an informal brief by the ACE CO years later. The mission boiled down to too many things going bad that could not be made good.
I firmly believe the scars of that night directly resulted in the successful execution of the Bin Laden raid. We (the DoD) learned the appropriate lessons, funded an organization (the 160th) to man/ train/ and equip to execute at that standard, and then when the time came they were ready. It’s tragic it took a loss of life and mission failure to teach such a lesson but we are hopefully better for it all now.
hlg6016
A/C Wings Here
Lessons where learned, Even though it was unpopular the CIC made the right call once he learned the assets where no longer there to complete the mission.