CH-53E Super Stallion Helicopter

    Going to talk about another United States Marine Corps (USMC) helicopter. The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter is the Marine Corps’ primary heavy lift helicopter and has been in service for over 30 years.  It is manufactured Sikorsky and there are currently over 152 CH-53E aircraft in operation.

    The awesome CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter uses GPS, doppler radar, FLIR, and ANVIS-HUD sensors to keep it safer while flying. To also keep it safe and attack enemies it uses .62mm and 50 caliber guns (as a mission kit). To keep in communications it used UHF/VHF/HF radios, secure comm. capability and IFF. Making this a really safe and deadly helicopter.

    This beast of a heavy-lift helicopter the Marine Corps use can carry a 26,000 pound light armored vehicle, 16 tons of cargo fifty miles and back (100 miles!). Or it can carry enough combat loaded Marines to lead an assault or a helpful humanitarian operation.

    Although the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter is powerful enough to lift every aircraft in the Marine inventory, except the KC-130, the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter is compact enough to deploy on amphibious assault ships, with its speed and agility it can easily qualify as much more than a heavy lifter.

    The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter is armed with window mounted 50 caliber machine guns.  It has chaff and flare dispensers for anti air defense. It even has an in-flight refueling probe for limitless range and forward-looking infrared (FLIR) imager for night and all-weather navigation. The  CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter is often called the assault transport of Marine ground forces.

    The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter has played many roles in our US wars. 1980s, the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter saw its first shipboard deployment. It was deployed in Beirut, Lebanon as a transport for peacekeepers. 1990s, it was used in Operation Desert Storm. 2000s, it was used in Afghanistan, Iraq.

    The crew takes two pilots, one crew chief/right gunner, one left gunner, one tail gunner (combat crew). Not including the crew the helicopter can transport 37 Marine troops and 55 with centerline centerline seats installed. It has a length of 99 feet and a half inches.The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter has a rotor diameter of 79 feet. A height of 27 feet and 9 inches. The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter has a nice disc area of 4,900 ft^2.

    To me this helicopter is like a Chinook helicopter and an Apache helicopter put together. It has power like a Chinook helicopter and the firepower like an Apache helicopter. It is the best of both worlds. If I was a Marine I might even like it better than the Cobra. My friend knows a lot about the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter and tells me it is a beast and he is really into aviation flying machines also.

    There is a chance after I graduate college and become an Army National Guard pilot I could become a United States Marine Corps pilot. That would be an amazing job.

Rayjun Ewell

10/31/2015

AH-1W/AH-1Z Super Cobra Attack Helicopter

                The AH-1W Super Cobra is the US Marines’ attack helicopter. This helicopter started its service in 1985 and its first flight was in 1969 but it is still in service and there are over 1,271 of them. Approximately 167 AH-W Super Cobra Helicopters are being used by the United States Marine Core. The Super Cobra can carry both TOW and Hellfire ant-armour missile. The TOW missile has a range of more than 3km semi-automatic command-to-line-of-sights guidance. The Hellfire missile has laser seeking and has a range of 7km.

    This is a very cool helicopter. And I actually had a Marine say I should fly for them. This is the one I would have wanted to fly. Perfect weapons and speed for me. It fires unguided 70mm rockest or a larger 127mm Zuni rocket bombs. The Super Cobra carries a three-barrel, 20mm Gatling fun for close-range (up to 2km) engagement and 750 rounds of ammunition. The pilot aims the gun by movine the helicopter in fixed-forward postition or one of the crew members can aim the gun by using the helmet mounted sight and aim the gun by just looking at the target. (like the apache gun)  

    The AH-1Z for the United States Marine Core will be armed with 16 Hellfire missiles, six AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, 70mm rocket pods (seven-shot and 19 shot and a 20mm gun. Meaning this helicopter is going to be packing some serious heat.

    Even with all of this heat a helicopter still needs countermeasures. The Cobra has AN/APR-39(XE2) radar warner and ATK AN/AAR47 missle warning system. It is equipped with AN/ALE-9 chaff and infarred flare depensers. The are used for when the helicopter is being shot at with missiles or RPGs, it pops out flares so that the missile blows up before it hits the helicopter so the helicopter doesn’t crash.

    AH-1W/AH-1Z Super Cobra Attack Helicopter has Twin General Electric T700-GE-401 turboshaft engines it grants the helicopter 2,410kW or 3,380shp. The AH-1W/AH-1Z Super Cobra Attack Helicopter can take off and climb out at more than 4.1 m/s on only one engine.  The helicopter can clie ate the rate of 8.2m a second. The helicopter has a great speed of 388km/h. Maximim endurance of the helicopter 3h and 30min. The helicopter weighs 4,953kg. Maximim take-off weight is 6,690kgm. 

    This will be an amazying helicopter to see one day. I have only seen a few helicoptes up close before and this one seems one of the more kick butt ones. I wa nt to take a ride in all of the helicopters I can. I don’t think I will get the chance to ride in this one, AH-1W/AH-1Z Super Cobra Attack Helicopter. Maybe one day. But for now I am still getting ready to go to basic combat training. Can not wait to get more into the aviation field. Helicoptes are cool!

 

The Apache Helicopter

    The Apache helicopter, it is know as one of the most kick-butt helicopters around the world. And with very good reason too. The Apache helicopter can fly at a top speed of 182 miles per hour and climb at a rate of 889m/min and as high as 15,000 feet with its four blades, twin-turboshaft engines each giving it 1265kW and tailwheel-type landing gear arrangement. It weighs 51,65kg and its maximum take off weight is 10,433kg.

    The Apache was first used in combat in 1989 in Panama. Then in 1997 (when I was born) the United States Army got delivered the first Apache Longbow. The Longbow has the  Longbow Hellfire missiles.

    The total main weapons are; a 30mm automatic Boeing M230 chain gun, it is located under the fuselage. It has a rate of fire of 625 rounds a minute and can hold 1,200 rounds of ammunition and take out a target over two miles away. Which is a very fast rate of fire for a round that big and being able to hold that much ammo of just that one caliber is amazing to me. It is armed with Lockheed Martin / Boeing AGM-114D Longbow Hellfire air-to-surface missile. The Hellfire missile can use a millimetre wave seeker that allows the missile to work in full fire and forget mode. It can shoot up to 8km to 12km. Besides having air-to-surface missiles, the Apache also has  air-to-air missiles. Like, Stingers, AIM-9s, sidewinders, Mistrals and sidearms. And it used really advanced guided precision kill aiming systems.

The AH-64 Longbow Apache carries the combo of armaments picked to use for the certain mission that it is going on. If it is going on a close support mission it will carry four four-rail launchers and four air-to-air missiles. (like the picture I added)

The Apache is like a flying tank.  The windshield is made out of reinforced glass that can take all kinds of small arms fire. Its primary adjective is to apply death and destruction on the battlefield. It can do removers in the air most helicopters can not do. It can do barrel rolls and loops. Which is very helpful if you are trying to dodge missiles or gunfire from an oncoming enemy.

It takes two years to become a pilot. It takes great nerves, they call it riding riding the dragon. A hard part of flying an Apache is shifting your eyes, because your right eyes is fitted with a monocle. 12 different images can be places in the monocles eye. Wherever you are looking is where the computer is going to aim the helicopter’s weapons.

I would love to become a Apache helicopter pilot. To have all of that firepower and go on awesome dangerous missions. But it is very hard to get into. First you have to be an officer the a warrant officer then go to flight school. That would definitely be worth it though. Flying one of the best helicopter’s in the world. 

  

Black Hawks

    Being a black hawk pilot would be my first choice in my aviation career. The UH-60 Black Hawk has been operational in the United States Army since 1978. There are different varities of the Black Hawk, the S-70 is the export version of the multi-mission UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter.

    In the United State’s military there are over 2000 UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters variants that are in service. And there are over 600 that are exported. There are over four million flying hours logged away with the Black Hawk helicopteres. The logged hours come from training and combat missions that took place in places like Grenada, Panama, the liberation of Kuwait, Somalla, Afghanistan, Iraq and many other humanitarian and rescue missions.

    The main function of the Black Hawk helicopter is as a troop carrier. (I would love flying awesome soldiers, they’ll say, “Ewell (sounds like you’ll) get us there.”) and logistical support aircraft, so just making sure ground troops have all the info they need. It can include functions like medical evacuation, command-and control, search-and-rescue, armed escort, electronic warfare and executive transport missions. (I think it would be really cool to fly down in to an area of operarion with a hummer handing from me and drop everyone off will I give support from the sky) The S-70  Black Hawk helicopter can fly for 11 fully equipped soldier or four litters. And when flying through high risk places the helicopter has the ability to tolerate small arms fire and most high-explosive, medium-calibre (23) projectiles.

The S-70 Black Hawk has a crew of three. The pilot, the copilot, they sit at the flight deck. And one crew member in the cabin. The S-70 can have a AFCS (automated flight computer system) instoled to help make piloting easier. The S-70 Black Hawk has many great multi-usage weapon systems. The S-70 can use a hellfire ant-armour missle that is laser-guided. The S-70 can carry 16 hellfire missiles. It carries the missiles in the external stores support system (ESSS). The ESSS can carry up to 10,000 pounds of payload. Tne S-70 Black Hawk can mount 7.62mm or .50-calibre machine guns in the windows. And to keep it safe from laser targeting systems it can use a Goodrich AN/AVR-2B laser threat warning system that will tell the crew when someone is trying to shoot them down.

To talk to troops and its command the S-70 is equipped with a voice and data communications suite including VHF, UHF communications, an identification friend or foe (IFF). It has two general electric turboshaft engines, the United State’s Army Black Hawks are fitted with the latest version, the 701D, it is rated at 2000shp.

I would love to be a Black Hawk pilot. My duties would be to navigate and communicate under combat conditions. Operate aircraft in all types of weather conditions during the day and night with night-vision. And carry out any orders my commanding officer tells me. This is one of the hardest jobs I can think of but I am up for the challenge.  

The CH-47 Chinook heavy-lift helicopter

    The CH-47D Chinook helicopter can master many missions. In the picture above you can see it carrying an artillery cannon. (artillery cannons are awesome and can shoot miles away and land within feet of their target.)  It is a great way to transport troops to far away places. In can carry a large number of equipment to the battlefield where it is needed. Medical evacuations are often needed in war and the Chinook is wonderful at that. In soldiers need to be parachute dropped they can use the Chinook. It can be used to find people in search and rescue. It is used to help fight fires and heavy construction jobs. Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm are some missions The Ch-47D Chinook took place in.

    There are over 1,179 Chinook helicopters operational worldwide. Including in Australia, Canada, Japan, Norway, Spain, the UK and three Far East countries. Boeing has delivered more than 480 Chinook helicopters to the United States Army and the Army National Guard. The CH-47F design has alterations to the airframe structure to reduce the effects of vibrations and other improvements to the helicopter. The Army is always upgrading everything to the newest and best stuff. The cockpit accommodates two pilots and an observer. The crew has ANVIS-7 night-vision goggles. For communications the helicopter has jam resistant HF and UHF radio systems, AN/APX-100 identification friend or foe (IFF) interrogator.

    The weapons on the Chinook helicopter are less great than some of the other helicopters like a Apache or even a Black Hawk. But still the Chinook helicopter is very deadly with its Three machine guns. Two of the machine guns can be mounted to the crew door on the starboard side. One of the machine guns can be mounted to the window-mount on the port side. It is also equipped with an AAr-54 missile warning system in January 2010.

    The Chinook helicopter’s has a great cargo system. It is a triple-hook system, which provides stability to large external loads or a lot of smaller loads. Using this good cargo system it can travel at speeds up to 260km/h carrying a 155mm howitzer (artillery cannon) under it. The Chinook helicopter’s cabin has 43m^3 of cargo space. The Chinook helicopter can carry up to two HMMWVs (high-mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicle) or one HMMWV and a 105mm howitzer gun and the crew to operate it. The Chinook can carry 33 fully equipped troops to 50 troops, depending on what is being carried and the mission.

    As you can see in the picture of the Chinook it has two sets of propellers. It is also equipped with two T55-L-712 turboshaft engines, which pod-mounted on either side of the rear pylon under the rear rotor blades. The Chinook’s engine has a continuous power of 3000shp and a maximum power of 3750shp.

     A really cool thing about the Chinook helicopter is that it’s back stabilizer isn’t a tail rotor. The Chinook used a second set of propellers that are safely above the troops heads when they are entering or exiting the helicopter. Skilled pilots can  hover with only the rear landing wheels touching the ground to unload. It would be to cool to become one of these skilled pilots one day in my military career.

 

Helicopter Pilot Jobs

    Helicopters can be used for many things and have countless jobs. Helicopters are great at flying working men and women to oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico or other oil rigs all over the sea. (In the movie Man of Steel) In an emergency a helicopter can rush to critically injured crash or a really ill person. If there is a major crash or wreck on the freeway a news helicopter can report it to keep people safer and save us time by not getting stuck in a traffic jam that is backed up because of the accident. I could never list all of the jobs a helicopter could do, there are just too many. This is why Helicopters are the workhorse of the aviation world. They are just to awesome!

    Since there are so many jobs a helicopter can do, there are countless number of businesses that can use helicopter pilots in a wide array of functions. One of the best abilities a helicopter and a helicopter pilot can do is land in small areas. Unlike plains being able to land in small areas opens up a lot more tasks a helicopter can do.

    These new helicopters are a lot better and can fly up to speeds that are really fast and way more helpful than a car. Rich people and businesses really like using helicopters as taxis for this reason. In big cities some really big skyscrapers have helicopter landing pads on their roofs. This is so rich people can get from business to business really quick.

    Unlike airplane or fixed-wings, a helicopter is rated different. A helicopter requires loads more training. Most of the time a pilot who is trying to build an airline career because of how different it is. But if you are a pilot who can fly both fixed-wing and rotary-wing then you are a kick-butt pilot and are very well qualified for most jobs. The famous saying is, If you can fly a helicopter, you can fly anything.

One of the jobs I find really interesting is, Pre-hospital blood product transfusion by U.S. Army MEDEVAC during combat operations. This would be really cool job to have if I get accepted into the army flight school.    

All of the flight medics have to use training and be qualified through a standardized and approved program of instruction. They have to use an elaborate cold chain system, and redundant documentation of blood product units ensured that a flight medic initiated transfusions are safe and effective.

I would love a helicopter job that is used to save lives. Being a life flight helicopter pilot for a hospital would be my dream job. Or being a medical evac in the army saving my fellow troops. Maybe being a fire rescue helicopter pilot were I have to fly down only where a helicopter and go to save someone. There could be a huge flood and people on their roofs need someone to save them. (not superman) In a police chase a helicopter would be handy to help catch the bad guy or worn people where he is going. Whatever the job is, with a helicopter it is the coolest job in the world.  

This is a really awesome video that explains the history of helicopters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_hScNDX53Y

It really shows the history of helicopters and does a good job showing what it was like for people who were trying to make something that was never made before.

 

The History of The Helicopter

     Inventors all over the world were interested in vertical flight. (Which is what a helicopter is.) At as early about 400 ce people were experimenting with different kinds of vertical lift machines. (Mostly toy/models or just ideas.) The Chinese had a toy that used the same principles of helicopters. It was a Chinese kite, which used a source of lift that was a rotary wing. It worked by pulling a string that turned a rotary blade making it spin and causing the toy to fly upwards. These toys were known during the middle ages.

    At the latter time of the 15th century, Leonardo Da Vinci drew pictures of what seemed like helicopters. That worked to obtain lift using a spiral airscrew. Another early work of helicopters was also another toy. Using real bird feathers to work as rotors. It was shown to the French Academy of Science in 1784 by two artisans, Launoy and Bienvenu. In 1870, Alphonse Penard in France, made greater successful model of this feathered toy.

    Sir George Clayley is the man who a lot of people call the father of fixed-wing flight. Sir George Clayley gave us the first exposition of the principles that led us to the successf.laul helicopter, in 1843.  After his new scientific principles, it started a growing amount of helicopter ideas from numerous inventors. Mostly models or sketches. Many did not work. But other inventors’ ideas contributed to the final solution of a helicopter.

    There were two significant steps forward in the history of the helicopter in 1907. The Breguet  brothers, Louis and Jacques, under the guidance of physiologist and aviation pioneer Charles Richet made a short flown flight in their Gyroplane No. 1, it was powered by one 45-horsepower engine. They did this short flight on September 29, 1907. The other significant step forward in the history of the helicopter in 1907 took place later in November. Their country man Paul Cornu, who was a bicycle maker just like the Write brothers (The brothers who invented the airplane), stayed at a free flight of twenty seconds’, flying at a distance of about one foot off the ground. He did it in a 24-horsepower engine twin-rotor craft.

    By now helicopters started showing more success all over the world. In 1912 the dDanish made features like contrarotating rotors and cyclic pitch control. On December 18, 1922 the U.S. Army Air Force lifted off the ground for less than two minutes. On January 9, 1923, Juan De La Cierra made a great flight in a autogiro. Later the technology is put into helicopters and helicopters make it obsolete. In 1936 Germany stepped to the forefront of helicopters development. They made the FaG-I, it made a lot of records. A flight of 11,243 feet off the ground and 143 miles across the country. The United States used the VS-300 in 1939-41. It was small and featured the same characteristics that most modern helicopters us.

    There are now a lot of kinds of helicopters, ranging from sizes and shapes, with different functions. I will get into more detail about these later in my blog. Can’t wait to start writing about the awesome stuff the new helicopters can do and all of their weapons. It is going to be great.

Rayjun Ewell

English1010

09/16/15

Blog Proposal

    My Proposal to do my blog is army helicopters. I am very interestested in them and I am working very hard to become a army helicopter pilot myself. I chose this topic because I really like the army and think helicopters are one of the coolest tools that the army has. I already know that they are really complicated and some of the history behind them. What I want to learn is more about their history and more detail on how they work.

    Hopefully while I am at RSP (Recruit Sustainment Program), BCT (Basic Combat Training), AIT (Advanced Individual Training) I will learn tons more on this subject and one day be an expert. If I get into flight school I am sure I will know a lot about what I want to learn. Before I go those places and learn more information I am sure I can look up and watch good informing videos about army helicopters.

    This topic is definitely important enough to merit a whole blog. Army helicopters is what I really want to learn about and do when I grow up. As of right now my MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) is 15 Brovo,. working on helicopter’s power-plants. This is a great job before you learn to fly them. Like riding a dirtbike, you want to know how it works first. Just having a blog to write down information about helicopters will be great. I won’t put any stuff down that might get me in trouble though. But I think this blog is going to be a really good thing to have. I really like this class right now and it is going great with my aviation degree. I can’t wait to learn more about helicopters and put a lot of cool information in my blog.

    I want to start my blog off with learning and writing about the history of helicopters. I will find out when they were first invented, what was the first helicopter and how it was used, when did the army start using them and what was their first use. I will find out who invented the first helicopter. And talk a little about them and why they invented the helicopter and what they thought it would be used for.

    I am really interested in medical helicopters. I want to research medical helicopters and put a lot of them in my blog. I will find out when the army start using medical helicopters and why they started, where they started, and how they started using them.

    After I talk about the history of helicopters and how they were first made, and after I talk about medical helicopters and the history about them, I will start to write about how many different types of army helicopters there are. I will write about all of their jobs and functions. Also talk about some of the normal helicopters and their jobs a little bit. As I write this blog I will definitely write about all the awesome weapons each one has and can carry.