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  • Talk of refueling in Shannon or Knock would surely be complicated by the need to provide security for aircraft with live missiles.

    Base the aircraft on the west coast and you comfortably cover the entire country and capital city and Irish Sea relatively quickly. You wil not be range limited.
    Base on the east coast and you are 150nm plus further away from the most likely threat.

    Comment


    • Originally posted by Sparky42 View Post
      Given Austria is replacing them due to costs, I don't see how we could even consider using the Typhoon tbh.
      Not so sure on that.
      The whole Eurofighter affair in Austria was a real political mess. In 2017 there was an announcement that they would replace the Eurofighter but so far nothing has happened, no RFI, no replacement program........ it takes about 10yrs for such a procurement.

      Comment


      • Originally posted by Jetjock View Post
        Talk of refueling in Shannon or Knock would surely be complicated by the need to provide security for aircraft with live missiles.

        Base the aircraft on the west coast and you comfortably cover the entire country and capital city and Irish Sea relatively quickly. You wil not be range limited.
        Base on the east coast and you are 150nm plus further away from the most likely threat.
        Yes, but the further you base a air corps technician from dublin, the more anaemic they get. Where will they get the "hedald" in Mayo?
        For now, everything hangs on implementation of the CoDF report.

        Comment


        • Originally posted by Jetjock View Post
          Talk of refueling in Shannon or Knock would surely be complicated by the need to provide security for aircraft with live missiles.

          Base the aircraft on the west coast and you comfortably cover the entire country and capital city and Irish Sea relatively quickly. You wil not be range limited.
          Base on the east coast and you are 150nm plus further away from the most likely threat.
          The most likely threat (Of which we would have advanced warning) but not the most dangerous (A threat to Dublin)

          Comment


          • Originally posted by DeV View Post
            The most likely threat (Of which we would have advanced warning) but not the most dangerous (A threat to Dublin)
            It would be highly unlikely if a threat to Dublin originated from the east and if it did it would most likely have been dealt with by our nearest neighbours.

            Dublin would be would be 10-12 minutes flying time from the west coast for a supersonic aircraft. For summits aircraft could be temporarily positioned to Baldonnel, like the Typhoons at Northolt during the London Olympics.

            There are more disadvantages to an East Coast basing than advantages. Range limiting the policing of an ongoing threat being the primary one. You don't base aircraft on a theoretical "what if". There has been no threat to Dublin from the air outside the Emergency (and a Canberra making a point) since the foundation of the state.

            Comment


            • Originally posted by Jetjock View Post
              Talk of refueling in Shannon or Knock would surely be complicated by the need to provide security for aircraft with live missiles.

              Base the aircraft on the west coast and you comfortably cover the entire country and capital city and Irish Sea relatively quickly. You wil not be range limited.
              Base on the east coast and you are 150nm plus further away from the most likely threat.
              while i think the solution you propose is the sensible one - out on the west coast, with big runways, far fewer people to annoy with noise, easy access to the BEAR routes etc... i think that the requirement for security at other airports because a visiting aircraft is live armed is probably overstated, and easily rectified if not.

              a 10,000 litre fuel bowser found at any airport will completely fuel two Gripen with maximum internal fuel, and three droptanks each. the security requirements, imv, could easily be met by taking the bowser and the Gripens out to a remote bit of the airfield with a couple of airport security and a copper or two. if you want to go wild put an Inf Pn at Shannon - you've got an Army, and an Inf heavy one - use it. it would be pretty easy to take an Inf Coy, give it additional training to refuel the aircraft, possibly drive the bowser etc... and then use that Inf Coy to support AC deployments whether Gripens or C-295 at Shannon or Knock.

              if the DF got into the fighter game, it would be a seismic change in the way the DF does a great many things - as well as what it did. re-roling an Inf Coy and moving it around a bit would barely qualify as going into the footnotes of the annual review...

              Comment


              • There is talk of the Air Corps deploying the PC12 overseas. They need to learn how deploy outside Baldonnel first. Shannon, Waterford, Sligo all went sour. Athlone has been a revelation, but it is still within the comfort of a barracks, same as Finner was.

                They can do it. I saw an AW139 go U/S in Kilworth due to a faulty exhaust cowling. They managed to fix it where it landed without having to roadload it back to workshops.
                Years before, a Kingair showed a fault in Cork Airport. Techies brought their tools, hopped into the back of a HS125 and headed down to sort it out on the ramp.
                If this goes ahead and we get in the fast jet game, then it will be necessary to deploy a flight overseas on frequent occasions for training (we don't have the infastructure for proper air to air training, and in all the wishlists there is no mention of one either). It's a skill the Air Corps needs to learn. Not just an aircraft or 2, but all the tools required to do the daily checks to keep it flying. (Having a military transport aircraft would help substantially here).
                Let's be honest, no sane person wants to live in Knock or Shannon of their own free will. But if the Naval Service are happy to live on a ship during the course of their duties for one month at a time for an extra €25, maybe something could be worked out to allow an aircraft, its crew, support vehicles and equipment to spend a rotation at one of our many far flung airfields rather than flying back to Dublin for tea every evening?
                For now, everything hangs on implementation of the CoDF report.

                Comment


                • If we look at paved runways which could handle a Grippen we have on the;

                  East Side of the country
                  Dublin
                  Baldonnel
                  Waterford

                  West Side of the country
                  Cork
                  Kerry
                  Shannon
                  Galway
                  Knock
                  Sligo
                  Donegal

                  Of those Dublin is the only one which has such a high utilisation we can ignore as a possible base for any potential QRA station. We could adopt something like the Swedish Base90 system which would have a main base with satellite airstrips away from it. So on a rotating basis a flight (4 A/C) deploy to a remote station for a month and an army company is deployed alongside to provide security. As well as the QRA flight we could deploy a PC12 also to get some expeditionary like training maybe with a small exercise or two with the company providing the security.
                  Last edited by EUFighter; 2 July 2020, 11:28.

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by EUFighter View Post
                    If we look at paved runways which could handle a Grippen we have on the;

                    East Side of the country
                    Dublin
                    Baldonnel
                    Waterford

                    West Side of the country
                    Cock
                    Kerry
                    Shannon
                    Galway
                    Knock
                    Sligo
                    Donegal

                    Of those Dublin is the only one which has such a high utilisation we can ignore as a possible base for any potential QRA station. We could adopt something like the Swedish Base90 system which would have a main base with satellite airstrips away from it. So on a rotating basis a flight (4 A/C) deploy to a remote station for a month and an army company is deployed alongside to provide security. As well as the QRA flight we could deploy a PC12 also to get some expeditionary like training maybe with a small exercise or two with the company providing the security.
                    I took a photo of the first airport on the west side of the country you mentioned. It's massive!

                    For now, everything hangs on implementation of the CoDF report.

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by na grohmiti View Post
                      I took a photo of the first airport on the west side of the country you mentioned. It's massive!

                      https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-eec1...=2&imbypass=on
                      It is just around the corner from A..hole of nowhere.

                      (Typo is now corrected, was still a bit asleep as I have not finish the Coffee Machine course yet

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by Jetjock View Post
                        It would be highly unlikely if a threat to Dublin originated from the east and if it did it would most likely have been dealt with by our nearest neighbours.

                        Dublin would be would be 10-12 minutes flying time from the west coast for a supersonic aircraft. For summits aircraft could be temporarily positioned to Baldonnel, like the Typhoons at Northolt during the London Olympics.

                        There are more disadvantages to an East Coast basing than advantages. Range limiting the policing of an ongoing threat being the primary one. You don't base aircraft on a theoretical "what if". There has been no threat to Dublin from the air outside the Emergency (and a Canberra making a point) since the foundation of the state.
                        Originally posted by ropebag View Post
                        while i think the solution you propose is the sensible one - out on the west coast, with big runways, far fewer people to annoy with noise, easy access to the BEAR routes etc... i think that the requirement for security at other airports because a visiting aircraft is live armed is probably overstated, and easily rectified if not.

                        a 10,000 litre fuel bowser found at any airport will completely fuel two Gripen with maximum internal fuel, and three droptanks each. the security requirements, imv, could easily be met by taking the bowser and the Gripens out to a remote bit of the airfield with a couple of airport security and a copper or two. if you want to go wild put an Inf Pn at Shannon - you've got an Army, and an Inf heavy one - use it. it would be pretty easy to take an Inf Coy, give it additional training to refuel the aircraft, possibly drive the bowser etc... and then use that Inf Coy to support AC deployments whether Gripens or C-295 at Shannon or Knock.

                        if the DF got into the fighter game, it would be a seismic change in the way the DF does a great many things - as well as what it did. re-roling an Inf Coy and moving it around a bit would barely qualify as going into the footnotes of the annual review...
                        Originally posted by na grohmiti View Post
                        There is talk of the Air Corps deploying the PC12 overseas. They need to learn how deploy outside Baldonnel first. Shannon, Waterford, Sligo all went sour. Athlone has been a revelation, but it is still within the comfort of a barracks, same as Finner was.

                        They can do it. I saw an AW139 go U/S in Kilworth due to a faulty exhaust cowling. They managed to fix it where it landed without having to roadload it back to workshops.
                        Years before, a Kingair showed a fault in Cork Airport. Techies brought their tools, hopped into the back of a HS125 and headed down to sort it out on the ramp.
                        If this goes ahead and we get in the fast jet game, then it will be necessary to deploy a flight overseas on frequent occasions for training (we don't have the infastructure for proper air to air training, and in all the wishlists there is no mention of one either). It's a skill the Air Corps needs to learn. Not just an aircraft or 2, but all the tools required to do the daily checks to keep it flying. (Having a military transport aircraft would help substantially here).
                        Let's be honest, no sane person wants to live in Knock or Shannon of their own free will. But if the Naval Service are happy to live on a ship during the course of their duties for one month at a time for an extra €25, maybe something could be worked out to allow an aircraft, its crew, support vehicles and equipment to spend a rotation at one of our many far flung airfields rather than flying back to Dublin for tea every evening?
                        I wasn’t suggesting a detachment to Sligo/Knock/Shannon/Cork I was suggesting a refuelling stop and in the case of a Bear needing an escort off the West coast a Temporary forward deployment (probably for no more than 2-3 hours) Before a handover is required.

                        Ref the threat it isn’t just Bears off the West coast that are a threat but also Terrorism (eg a 9/11 type scenario). Don’t forget that Dublin Had become (pre-covid) a hub airport. It’s close to our biggest population centre and a lot of aircraft transit Irish airspace.

                        Dublin has a lot of airspace infringements as is


                        If that €25 was €50 they wouldn’t have as bad a retention issue

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by EUFighter View Post
                          If we look at paved runways which could handle a Grippen we have on the;

                          East Side of the country
                          Dublin
                          Baldonnel
                          Waterford

                          West Side of the country
                          Cork
                          Kerry
                          Shannon
                          Galway
                          Knock
                          Sligo
                          Donegal

                          Of those Dublin is the only one which has such a high utilisation we can ignore as a possible base for any potential QRA station. We could adopt something like the Swedish Base90 system which would have a main base with satellite airstrips away from it. So on a rotating basis a flight (4 A/C) deploy to a remote station for a month and an army company is deployed alongside to provide security. As well as the QRA flight we could deploy a PC12 also to get some expeditionary like training maybe with a small exercise or two with the company providing the security.
                          worth noting that a Gripen E with three big tanks, full internal fuel and two AIM-120/Meteor, and two AIM-132/AIM-9/IRIS-T is at pretty much MTOW. its not going to be doing any short take offs or throttling back to limit the noise complaints.

                          you need big tanks because it has to fly a long way and you don't have tankers...

                          QRA aircraft tend to do lots of take-off/landing cycles per flying hour because stuff often gets resolved after they've taken off, but before they've spent an hour at M2, so not only do they do heavy take-offs, they do heavy landings. big, long runways required...

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by DeV View Post
                            I wasn’t suggesting a detachment to Sligo/Knock/Shannon/Cork I was suggesting a refuelling stop and in the case of a Bear needing an escort off the West coast a Temporary forward deployment (probably for no more than 2-3 hours) Before a handover is required.

                            Ref the threat it isn’t just Bears off the West coast that are a threat but also Terrorism (eg a 9/11 type scenario). Don’t forget that Dublin Had become (pre-covid) a hub airport. It’s close to our biggest population centre and a lot of aircraft transit Irish airspace.

                            Dublin has a lot of airspace infringements as is

                            i wouldn't get too mired in the location vs threat vs speed thing - Dublin is nine minutes flying time from Shannon at 900mph, stick Readiness 5 on top and you're looking at having a pair of Gripen 30,000ft over Temple Bar 14 minutes after the phone call gets made. if you want to go hard, you could have a pair of Meteors over Dublin Castle in 11 minutes (somewhat less, perhaps..?)...

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by ropebag View Post
                              i wouldn't get too mired in the location vs threat vs speed thing - Dublin is nine minutes flying time from Shannon at 900mph, stick Readiness 5 on top and you're looking at having a pair of Gripen 30,000ft over Temple Bar 14 minutes after the phone call gets made. if you want to go hard, you could have a pair of Meteors over Dublin Castle in 11 minutes (somewhat less, perhaps..?)...
                              In which case it is no problem having them based on Baldonnel

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by DeV View Post
                                In which case it is no problem having them based on Baldonnel
                                Speed isn't the issue looking West. It's range.

                                Comment

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