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  • Knock has no ramp space. You put three 737s or A320s in it and it's jammed.

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    • Originally posted by GoneToTheCanner View Post
      Knock has no ramp space. You put three 737s or A320s in it and it's jammed.
      Build a new military ramp at the west end of the airport away from the passenger terminal, near to where I assume the A380s are being scraped?
      It was the year of fire...the year of destruction...the year we took back what was ours.
      It was the year of rebirth...the year of great sadness...the year of pain...and the year of joy.
      It was a new age...It was the end of history.
      It was the year everything changed.

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      • It's still a small airport. You'd need to add a lot of infrastructure to make it viable; parking, fuel, hangar, etc

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        • Hate to be coming across as this guy.

          But if we're going to get fast jets, every airfield over 800m should have a QRA capable dispersal facility; And more such airfields should be built.

          Carrickfinn would be an ideal prototype location.

          Realise this will probably require the establishment of an Air Corps security batt.
          Last edited by The Usual Suspect; 27 November 2020, 19:23.

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          • Originally posted by GoneToTheCanner View Post
            It's still a small airport. You'd need to add a lot of infrastructure to make it viable; parking, fuel, hangar, etc
            And there still would be no getting away from the fact Knock, like Cork Airport is built at the top of a hill and suffers from a higher proportion of fog bound days than more suitable located airfields.

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            • Originally posted by The Usual Suspect View Post


              Hate to be coming across as this guy.

              But if we're going to get fast jets, every airfield over 800m should have a QRA capable dispersal facility; And more such airfields should be built.

              Carrickfinn would be an ideal prototype location.

              Realise this will probably require the establishment of an Air Corps security batt.
              The AC doesn’t have the personnel or aircraft for detachments, nor is the State big enough.

              If the need ever arose there are a good few places they could be dispersed to in an emergency



              1 central base and refuel elsewhere as required

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              • Originally posted by DeV View Post
                The AC doesn’t have the personnel or aircraft for detachments, nor is the State big enough.

                If the need ever arose there are a good few places they could be dispersed to in an emergency



                1 central base and refuel elsewhere as required
                If and we all know it would be a big if we had jet fighters for QRA the AC would need to be several times what it is today.
                Dispersal does not mean a permanent basing, it is a temporary use of an area. It would be good to have a dedicated site like Carrickfinn so that the AC could train for dispersal sites.
                It would also give them experience for joint training with the EU Battlegroups, say a detachment in Sweden at a BAS90 strip.

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                • It certainly makes sense to have options in terms of dispersal/diversions, but I think the idea that you'd need/want several with extensive facilities for a pretty limited (numerically) force that is only a few minutes by flying by time from any no number of usable runways is taking it all to far.

                  Any of the commercial airfields could support a Gripen det/out-landing, and if you want to practice FOBing you could use West Freugh, or Stornoway, or Luchars, or Keflavik, or any of 50 airfields within comfortable flying range.

                  Personally I'd use Shannon as the main AC base, and run deployment exercises at Dublin airport for things like EU heads of government summits, and somewhere like West Freugh for really austere exercises.

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                  • Bear in mind that this small country has 9 commercial airports, 1 active military base, 1 inactive military base, dozens of airfields and hundreds of airstrips capable of hosting helicopters, apart from the actual surveyed helipads. More than enough for a small island. That's not counting what's available in the North. You could practise any kind of combat deployment without leaving the Republic, let alone the island.

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                    • Originally posted by Jetjock View Post
                      And there still would be no getting away from the fact Knock, like Cork Airport is built at the top of a hill and suffers from a higher proportion of fog bound days than more suitable located airfields.
                      Do you have actual figures to back the fog claim? I have tried to find data but could not and IMHO most airports in Ireland are limited by cross-wind more than by fog. In fog an airport can be equipped up to CAT-IIIC which would allow landing even in the most severe fog conditions (not nice for the pilot but allowed - see JAS-OPS). However as most airports have only a single runway they will be subjected to crosswind limitations more than to fog.

                      Delays due to fog are usually down to the increased traffic separation rather than landing requirements which is why fog in London, which has CAT-IIIC airports causes so many delays. There the capacity of the system is at its limit so when ATC increases separation that removes capacity leading to delays and cancellations. Apart from Dublin Airport none of our other airports have capacity limits.

                      As for the conditions at Knock Airport I would expect most of its low visibility would come from low cloud rather than from fog. They might look similar but are different meteorological conditions with totally different formation criteria.

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                      • Originally posted by ropebag View Post
                        It certainly makes sense to have options in terms of dispersal/diversions, but I think the idea that you'd need/want several with extensive facilities for a pretty limited (numerically) force that is only a few minutes by flying by time from any no number of usable runways is taking it all to far.

                        Any of the commercial airfields could support a Gripen det/out-landing, and if you want to practice FOBing you could use West Freugh, or Stornoway, or Luchars, or Keflavik, or any of 50 airfields within comfortable flying range.

                        Personally I'd use Shannon as the main AC base, and run deployment exercises at Dublin airport for things like EU heads of government summits, and somewhere like West Freugh for really austere exercises.
                        As stated already we have a lot of airports suitable in Ireland including 3 that are currently closed to commercial traffic: Sligo, Waterford and Galway. If the AC did have the jets (24-32 needed for 24/7/365) and did want to train deploying to an austere base it is not just a matter of flying the jets there. It would also mean transporting ground support crew and equipment, stores, fuel and a security detail. Thus having a training "austere" airport on the island of Ireland would be a lot easier that going off-island. Remember we have never deployed an AC oversea yet and to get up to speed will take a lot of training.

                        Dublin Airport is one of the busiest airports in Europe hence why they are getting the second runway. To try and integrate a jet fighter deployment training into DA would be a nightmare and would likely be a non-starter.

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                        • The early morning queue in Dublin of aircraft waiting to take off tells its own story.
                          For now, everything hangs on implementation of the CoDF report.

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                          • Originally posted by ropebag View Post
                            Personally I'd use Shannon as the main AC base, and run deployment exercises at Dublin airport for things like EU heads of government summits, and somewhere like West Freugh for really austere exercises.
                            I would keep the Casement for Heli ops and the such, As EUFighter says, Dublin is affectively Ireland's Heathrow. The RAF don't keep RAF Northolt for the fun of it do they?
                            It was the year of fire...the year of destruction...the year we took back what was ours.
                            It was the year of rebirth...the year of great sadness...the year of pain...and the year of joy.
                            It was a new age...It was the end of history.
                            It was the year everything changed.

                            Comment


                            • (This whole thing is getting into Walt territory) but any QRA jets on the east coast would be a redundant overlap with RAF Lossiemouth- far better to station them on the west coast and enter a service level agreement that the would cover the east and in return we cover the western approaches which benefits them by increasing the depth of their defences.we could use Dublin airport for temporary deployments during summits etc

                              Shannon would make sense as it’s quiet and the coastguard heli would provide SAR cover for pilot recovery
                              Another issue not mentioned- most nations have SAR assets with the range to get a ditched pilot back

                              Also if we were begging for freebies from Joe Hornets would make more sense- twin engines.
                              Last edited by warthog; 28 November 2020, 11:44.

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by warthog View Post
                                (This whole thing is getting into Walt territory) but any QRA jets on the east coast would be a redundant overlap with RAF Lossiemouth- far better to station them on the west coast and enter a service level agreement that the would cover the east and in return we cover the western approaches which benefits them by increasing the depth of their defences.we could use Dublin airport for temporary deployments during summits etc

                                Shannon would make sense as it’s quiet and the coastguard heli would provide SAR cover for pilot recovery
                                Another issue not mentioned- most nations have SAR assets with the range to get a ditched pilot back

                                Also if we were begging for freebies from Joe Hornets would make more sense- twin engines.
                                Be careful, twin engines does not today actually mean it is safer. Modern engines are extremely reliable and the need for redundancy from year gone by does not mean improved safety. A reason why two most commercial jets are twin and not triple or quads is that the need to cope with "one engine out" during the start, if that requirement was removed there would be a move to single engine aircraft (provided we could get the power). The reason is probability, every engine has the same probability to fail if maintained the same as the others, but adding more engines raises the probability the there will be a failure.

                                If you have a engine shut down rate of 1 in 10,000 hrs for that engine type, then a single engine aircraft has a 1:10,000 chance of experiencing a shut down. However if you had a second engine that probability raises to 2:10,000, as both engines have the same probability. In any case the air force with the greatest experience of over water flying the US Navy is currently equipping itself with F-35C's which are single engined. Indeed a lot of the aircraft that it ever operated were single engine aircraft, A-4, A-7, F-8 etc. So while the Hornet could be a good candidate it is not because it is twin engined.

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