Worried Murtha Checking MV-22

A retired Marine who also happens to be one of the most powerful defense lawmakers, Rep. Jack Murtha, has begun raising questions about the future of the Osprey MV-22 The chairman of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee said that he plans to go down to Camp Lejeune in the next few weeks to do a reality check. “That’s where I’m going to find out what the hell is happening,” the ever-blunt Murtha said.

“The military tends to give you nothing but optimistic portrayals,” he added. “They have been telling me the V-22 was doing fine.” Well, not so much, as was made clear at yesterday’s hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The Osprey does face “severe maintenance problems,” Murtha said, adding that they are to be expected in the early stages of an aircraft’s deployment.

While he said “it’s just too early to know” just what to do about the aircraft, Murtha also made pretty clear that he does not think it necessary to shut down production of the MV-22, as his colleague, Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said yesterday. “At this point we are committed and we have to go forward with the V-22,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Marines began their counterattack designed to rescue the hostage MV-22. I spoke for about an hour this afternoon with Lt. Col. Rob Freeland, an Osprey pilot with about 1,000 hours on the plane.

He made it very clear that the Marines are doing everything they can to bring down maintenance costs. The GAO report presented at yesterday’s hearing claimed the current cost per flight hour of the “MV-22 today is over $11,000—more than double the target estimate and 140 percent higher than the cost for the CH-46E.” Freeland said the flying hour cost for the B model — the plane that is flying in combat — is closer to $9,700 and will come down over the next two to four years as the Marines implement a range of engineering change orders and craft a maintenance contract.

Among the engineering changes the Marines have recently made to save money, Freeland listed infrared suppressor panels. “We used to replace those at $110,000 a piece. That’s because we didn’t expect them to break,” he said. Now the service is repairing them for $10,000 per unit. In addition, they have developed $10,000 repair procedures for flaperons that they used to replace $280,000 a pop. And Coanda valves will be repaired for $5,000 instead of replacing them for $27,000.

“We know we are on a path that will get us there,” to lower maintenance costs, he said. The performance based maintenance contract currently being negotiated will lead to the longest lasting and most substantial savings over time, he predicted. Due to be signed in 2010, that contract should start showing substantial savings after three years.

Read the rest of this story and others at DoD Buzz.

-- Colin Clark

Osprey to Deploy With New Firepower

The Marine Corps is taking the Osprey to its fight in Afghanistan – and it’s a more lethal version than the MV-22 the Corps’ top aviation officer credited with helping tame Iraq’s Anbar province.

Pending successful testing, the Corps plans to deploy a contingent of recently developed weapons system kits that will provide the MV-22 Osprey with 360-degree firepower, according to Lt. Gen. George J. Trautman III, deputy commandant for aviation.

But Trautman confessed the Corps won’t rack up body counts with the new weapon, which is defensive in nature, designed for fire suppression during high-speed infil and exfil missions.

“I wouldn’t expect to kill a lot of people with this system,” Trautman said. “It’s a very difficult challenge without sophisticated fire control technology to be precise in your targeting.”

The Corps has ordered nine of the so-called Remote Guardian System kits, but hopes to buy scores more to outfit the entire fleet of MV-22 aircraft. The 7.62mm rotary cannon in the RGS is mounted in the belly of an Osprey and is controlled by a crewman with a video game-like joystick and video monitor.

The service is also working to upgrade the Osprey’s ramp-mounted machine gun to a .50 caliber version from its current M240 7.62mm machine gun.

The Osprey, Trautman boasts, will redefine the Afghan battle space where Leathernecks tangle with insurgent and Taliban forces in small units separated by 8,000-foot snow-capped mountains and vast rocky badlands.

“We’re incredibly confident [that] having the Osprey in that environment is going to pay dividends for our forces, and that’s why we are intently focused on getting the aircraft into that theater,” he said during an interview with military bloggers.

Trautman said the Corps’ aim is to deploy a handful of RGS detachable mission kits armed with surveillance capabilities on an MV-22 squadron bound for Afghanistan’s harsh environment this fall.

Thousands of Marines are expected to join in the increased American troop presence in Afghanistan following President Barack Obama’s call for 10,000 more boots and rifles to wrest control from a resurgent Taliban.

Trautman’s announcement follows the completion of months of testing by the Air Force Special Operations Command on the BAE Systems’ mission kits, which now gives the aircraft what many critics said it lacked from the beginning: an all-quadrant gun.

Both AFSOC and the Corps hope the new weapons package will enhance an aircraft that Trautman described as “marvelously successful” after 19 months in Iraq.

“The performance thus far tells us that the aircraft completed every assigned mission and it did so flying faster, farther and with safer flight profiles than any other assault aircraft in the history of military operations,” Trautman said.

Dogged by controversy and fatalities during its decades-long development and testing, the Osprey has apparently emerged tougher and smarter for its trials and is delivering Marines significant advantages over its predecessor in the CH-46 Sea Knight. And the new kit will now silence critics who have long called for an all-quadrant weapon for the aircraft.

“There’s a reason we haven’t put an all-aspect weapon on the Osprey in the last decade,” Trautman said. “It’s a tough technical challenge… and has taken us a while to figure it out in an affordable way.”

Trautman acknowledged that readiness issues brought on by environmental factors – fine Iraqi dust – hampered the Osprey’s three combat tours in Iraq, but he said a refined system should help ensure replacements are in place downrange when critical components fail.

In Afghanistan, the Osprey’s Gatling gun will join another new detachable weapons package as the Corps plans to introduce a slightly different weapons portfolio to its KC-130J Super Hercules refueler-transports.

Dubbed Harvest Hawk, the KC-130J may incorporate up to three weapons as well as a sophisticated surveillance system. The Corps is exploring including four wing-based Hellfire missiles, rear ramp-based precision munitions and a paratroop door-positioned cannon to the aircraft.

Both the MV-22 and KC-130J weapons packages are roll-on/roll-off kits that can be affixed to the aircraft in upwards of six hours. They are both manned by a dedicated crewman positioned in the rear of the cabin who operates a fire-control system that combines the video feeds and weapons control.

Trautman said the weapons portfolio will be used much like a helicopter crew, in which the pilot spots a target and talks the fire-control operator onto the target.

Trautman expects the speed and range of the MV-22 will help “turn Texas into Rhode Island” for Marine commanders in Afghanistan’s vast expanses, much like the Osprey did in Iraq.

-- Bryan Mitchell

BREAK-BREAK: Ospreys Grounded (Update)

We're working the details now, but apparently a loose bolt was found in an area near the rotors on deployed MV-22 Ospreys which was worrying enough to Red Stripe the entire fleet.

Colin's banging out all the information he could get in a piece for DoD Buzz, but for now, that's what I've got.

Be sure to check over at the Buzz for more information in a few minutes.

UPDATE:All 84 Ospreys were temporarily grounded following the discovery of loose bolts in a V-22 in Iraq.

"This is a temporary grounding bulletin issued strictly as a precautionary measure," NavAir spokesman Mike Welding said Tuesday evening. "If one of those came lose in flight, the worst case scenario you would lose control of the affected prop rotor," he said, adding that no planes had been affected in flight. "Our priority first and foremost is safety."

Four planes have had problems with the bolts, which help control the rotors. Two of those are back in the air, Welding said. The repairs take two days, he said.

All the affected planes are in Iraq, he said, adding that the cause of the loose bolts is not entirely clear yet and investigations are proceeding to figure out why they came loose.

The Marines expect the "red stripe" notice "to have a minimal impact on operations," said Maj. Eric Dent, a Marine spokesman in Washington.

-- Christian

Gettin' Ospreys Dirty

There are a couple more things from the MGen. Kelly interview that I wanted to throw out there for you all to ponder.

First, Kelly showered pretty high praise on the MV-22 Osprey in his theater. He added more to the "higher, farther, faster" argument that most proponents (and some reporters like yours truly) say about the bird, and took on the argument that the MV-22 wasn't really tested in the Iraq deployment -- namely because it wasn't dropping into hot LZs.

"When I got there there was some criticism that the airplane was untested and all that and that the Marines are protecting it and the commanders won't let it go into hot LZs," Kelly said. "Well, the fact is, you don't intentionally ever go into a hot LZ. If you go into a hot LZ knowingly, you're probably not playing smart baseball. ... Gen. Odierno and Gen. Petraeus fell in love with it ... because it zips around the way it does it was doing a lot more VIP lifting that I thought it should, so I took it out of the VIP business and got it dirty."

So this is the argument I was bandying around last year when I came back from Iraq (I spent a week with VMM-263 in the first ever Osprey deployment). Kelly understands the logic behind exchanging speed, altitude (and th ability to attain altitude very quickly) and reduced audio signature (he said the aircraft can come down rapidly from 9K feet to a vertical landing with a lot less noise than a CH-46 or 53) with .50cal machine guns. And he knows than when a commander can, he'll try to avoid a hot LZ every time because it ain't like a Phrog or a Shitter can do much better -- they'd be sitting ducks too.

And here's some more he said about the reliability argument:

"The availability numbers when I first got there hovered around 65 percent or so and by the time I left it was pretty standard at about 85 percent the Marines that fix and work on it understand what parts go sooner rather than later ... the young mechanics learned what needed to be done to keep it up, so I think it's fully tested."

This is a point I really can't shed any light on other than to say that maintainers I talked to in Iraq at the time said the down time for the Osprey wasn't any more than any other aircraft they'd maintained, and was much less than the 46. There were some problems with things going bad before expected and things not going bad that were expected to fail sooner (resulting in parts surpluses and shortages), but that's what you learn during a first deployment, right?

Kelly also partially answered the question of the Osprey's suitability in Afghanistan. He said the CH-46 can only carry about four passengers and crew in the summer and about 10 pax plus the crew in the winter. The 53 does well in Afghanistan, but is in short supply.

"The 46 is very, very limited in what it can do over there. That's why the 53 is so important over there, it's got the legs and it's got the power. But the V-22 will do it all."

I'm not sure why it's taken so long to deploy the MV-22 to Afghanistan, but I figure with the upcoming "surge" we'll see it buzzing the mountain tops pretty soon.

-- Christian

Air Force Flies CV-22s to Africa and Back

For the first time ever, a detachment of V-22 Ospreys deployed from its home base in the United States, flying across the Atlantic Ocean to an exercise in northern Africa.

Four CV-22 Ospreys from the Hurlburt Field, Fla.-based 8th Special Operations Squadron lifted off in October from the sand dunes and palm trees of their Gulf coast base and flew more than 6,000 miles to the rock-strewn deserts of Bamako, Mali.

The aircraft operated for about three weeks there in support of Operation Flintlock - a joint 10th Special Forces Group and North African commando exercise intended to sharpen combat skills and build military-to-military relations.

But it was also a coming out party for the special operations version of the Osprey.

"We were really able to validate the direction we were going -- in training and development-wise - [and] that we were on track," said 8th SOS commander Lt. Col. Eric Hill in a Dec. 18 interview with Military.com. "We're ready for anything at this point. We're ready as a squadron and we're ready as a capability."

An earlier plan to self-deploy a squadron of MV-22s from Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 263 to combat duty in Iraq in 2007 had to be scrubbed because of worries that some of the onboard systems weren't robust enough to accommodate the grueling long-distance flight.

Critics pointed to the Osprey's finicky de-icing system, designed to shed frozen water from the aircraft's wings on cold, high altitude flights, as the main reason why the Marines' Ospreys were shipped to Kuwait by boat rather than giving the plane a chance to prove its advertised capability.

But after months of training and meticulous planning to avoid nasty weather, the pilots and crew from the 8th SOS made it to Mali after two overnight stops and multiple mid-air refuelings - a major achievement for an aircraft the Air Force is purchasing to replace the venerable MH-53 Pave Low.

"Since this was the first time we've flown trans-Atlantic we did do some rehearsals," Hill said. "Not as long in duration, but to rehearse and refine [techniques] to execute that deployment."

While in Mali, the Airmen flew a variety of missions, including - all in one evening - nighttime infiltration and extraction missions over distances of nearly 600 miles, high altitude, low opening parachute drops, and fast-rope commando operations.

Unlike the MV-22, the Air Force version of the Osprey incorporates high-tech terrain-following radar and navigation systems that proved invaluable to pilots during the exercise.

"Due to the weather there there's a lot of smoke, dust and whatnot in the air and under night vision goggles it made it sometimes very difficult to follow the terrain visually," said CV-22 pilot Capt. Luke Sustman. "We definitely relied greatly on our terrain-following radar."

The squadron deployed to Mali with a host of spares and enough maintenance equipment to keep their Ospreys flying. But the rigors of the environment did keep some CV-22s out of the air.

Though squadron officials were quick to say they fulfilled every mission, there were a few hydraulic leaks and other system failures that kept maintainers on their toes.

"We basically went overseas to get an idea of what parts we would need [for sustainment], to test out our shipping processes and needs, [and] to make sure they could meet our demand. And they did," said Tech Sgt. Monte Taylor, a CV-22 maintainer with the squadron.

For the most part, the 8th SOS Airmen had the same compliments for the Osprey that Marine pilots and crew have for their tiltrotors. The speed and range of the Osprey - particularly in a special operations environment where getting in and out quickly is paramount - allowed pilots to run missions other aircraft couldn't.

And wile they all applauded their new, high-tech aircraft, some of the Airmen did so with a tear in their eye.

"Honestly, I'd say it does the mission a little bit better than the Pave Low did," said Master Sgt. Mark Matel, a CV-22 flight engineer who spent nearly 13 years flying in MH-53s. "It kind of breaks my heart to say that."

"But it takes off faster, it stops faster, and it's faster en route," he added. "And speed is a key player to what we're doing out there in today's missions."

-- Christian

Osprey Fire Docs

Here is some supporting documentation from the JAGMAN I obtained. I have only scanned a few pages, including the Opinions and Recommendations, testimony of the command pilot, the airframe change notice and some pictures of the aircraft.

-- Christian

Hydraulic Failure Caused Osprey Fire

A catastrophic fire that nearly engulfed a Marine Corps MV-22B Osprey late last year was sparked by a leaking hydraulic line in the left-side engine nacelle, investigators found.

The fire broke out about half way through a nearly five-hour training mission, when fluid from a key hydraulic system that powers landing gear, opens the rear door and helps filter the air inlets to the Osprey's engines poured out of the lines after spikes in pressure fractured the thin-walled tubes.

The fluid drained onto the infrared suppressor section of the nacelle -- where hot exhaust from the engine is cooled to cut down on the plane's heat signature -- sparking the mid-air fire which caused more than $16 million in damage to the aircraft, according to the Judge Advocate General Manual Investigation report obtained by Military.com.

Both pilots and three crew members who were aboard the MV-22 for the Nov. 6 night vision goggle training flight survived the incident after landing the aircraft in Landing Zone Phoenix at Camp Lejeune, N.C. The aircraft has not been repaired and returned to flight status, the Corps said.

The fire occurred about seven months after the service admitted another blaze in the same part of the aircraft had ignited just before takeoff. The Corps called the earlier incident a "minor nacelle fire" in a news release at the time, and told Military.com in an email response to questions regarding the November fire that the service "was in the process of implementing appropriate aircraft modifications when this incident occurred."

"All Ospreys in flight operation have the modifications, including those that are deployed," wrote Maj. Eric Dent, a spokesman at Marine Corps headquarters in Washington. "The modifications have also been fully incorporated into the V-22 production line so that new aircraft will not require further modification after leaving the factory.

The investigation report, which was released to Military.com after a Freedom of Information Act request, also cites the maintenance control division of the New River, N.C.-based Marine Medium Tiltrotor Training Squadron 204 for allowing the MV-22 to fly a nearly five-hour training mission before undergoing an inspection of the engine air particle separator -- the area where the hydraulic lines failed.

"The evidence supports that there was not enough time remaining on the [mishap aircraft] to complete the 4.5 hour event that was scheduled," the report states. "It was not inspected due to an error in tracking flight hours accumulated on the" mishap aircraft.

Potentially more worrying, the system designed to control a fire in the Osprey's two nacelles -- a compartment situated at the end of each wing that houses the engine and tiltrotor propulsion system -- failed to extinguish the blaze even though it was activated by the pilot before he escaped the burning plane.

The Corps says it is looking into a new solution to the fire suppression failure but explained that new modifications will allow more hydraulic fluid to drain should another rupture occur. Dent added that the VMMT-204 maintainers "misinterpreted" the inspection requirement and that a new automatic logging system will correct the problem.

No one was disciplined as a result of the incident.

Pictures of the MV-22 provided in the JAGMAN report show a twisted hulk at the end of the left wing, the Osprey's huge rotors bent downward, melted composite material solidified in mid-air as it dripped toward the ground.

Problems with the Osprey's ultra-lightweight hydraulic system are not new. In 2000, a hydraulic tube ruptured after a wire bundle chafed the thin-walled titanium, causing a crash near New River that killed four Marines.

Despite a thorough redesign after the fatal crash, the Bell-Boeing manufactured Osprey suffered another hydraulic failure in March 2007 that caused an engine fire -- a failure of the same hydraulic system investigators point to in the November mishap.

An Airframe Change Notice dated Aug. 3, 2007, included in the report indicated the Osprey's engine air particle separator needed to be retrofitted with thicker hydraulic tubing.

The modifications were made to newer, so-called "Block B" aircraft -- the ones sent to Iraq on the Corps' first deployment of the MV-22 in combat. But some "Block A" Ospreys that were awaiting the retrofit still flew despite the danger of a hydraulic rupture.

-- Christian

How the Osprey Gun Works...

[Sorry for the delay, folks. Had an interview with Obama's top defense advisor, former Navy Secretary Richard Danzig this AM...More to follow on that later.]

At the Modern Day Marine Expo, Adamiak explained that the crew chief will use an X-Box-like controller to move and shoot the gun. The GAU-17 (GAU-2 for the SOCOM version) Gatling gun is slaved to a sensor that rolls down out of the Osprey belly when the gun deploys -- housing a CCD camera, IR camera and laser range finder.

The gun can track 360 degress, but there is a software-driven safety zone that makes sure rounds don't blow the rotors off. If the Osprey has to maneuver away from the target and the crew chief can't hold the gun on the bad guys manually, the system slaves the gun to the point of the last shot, slewing it as the plane moves. The fire control computer compensates for range and angle as well.

There is no capability for the pilot to control the gun, but there's an auto feature than swings the gun to the barrel forward position, 10 degrees down so the pilot can steer the Osprey onto target. But he can't fire the weapon, that'll still be up to the crew chief in the back.

-- Christian

The Osprey Gun

Went to the 2008 Modern Day Marine expo today down at Quantico and got a ton of good material I'll be shooting your way over the next couple days.

First, I attended a breakfast meeting with the folks from BAE Systems. There was an interesting brief on the Remote Guardian System, that underbelly Gatling gun the company is developing for the MV and CV-22.

I've posted a video of Biz Dev director Dave Adamiak explaining the components and I'll post another soon after that shows the system in use on a simulator. I did press Dave on the issue of the Corps' reluctance to use powered defensive weapons on their rotorcraft for fear that a loss of power would leave the aircraft vulnerable. That's why for years the Corps had rejected rotary cannon on their helos in favor of the trusted, Marine-proof "Ma Deuce."

Dave, rightly I think, admitted the Corps was leery but explained that there is no better solution based on the Osprey's design. The tail gun will probably stay, he said, since the Guardian has to be retracted when the V-22 lands.

He said BAE has flown the Guardian on an AFSOC CV-22 and all is going well there. Clearly the Osprey needs a defensive weapon, but will this complex system prove itself Marine-proof enough to be cost-effective in the long run?

-- Christian

Developing: Hydraulic Failure Caused Nov. Osprey Fire

I've gotten my hands on an investigation report into the fire that nearly destroyed an MV-22 back in November during an NVG training flight near New River, N.C.

[NOTE: Picture is a scan from one provided in the investigation report]

Turns out, the fire sparked after the #3 hydraulic system ruptured due to pressure spikes from the engine air particle separator which filters inlet air before it is ingested by the engine. The hydraulic fluid spilled all over the IR suppression system, igniting the left nacelle into a ball of flame. The pilots and crew landed safely but the nacelle was a melted, twisted hulk. It caused $16 million in damages.

The crazy part is that this is a known problem. Our friend Bob Cox of the Ft. Worth Star Telegram has reported this same rupture before and his sources in the maintenance community indicate to him the problem is much worse than the Corps admits. In fact, the report shows a Airframe Change notice (#88) that calls for the installation of thicker hydraulic tubing in the EAPS system because of known pressure spikes that can cause a "catastrophic failure." That notice came out in August, three months before the November incident.

The Corps (an Navy) told us not to worry, this was a problem on the Block A aircraft and the retrofits would go on those. Problem is, the November fire happened on a Block B Osprey [CORRECTION: Corps PA says the mishap aircraft was indeed a Block A bird].

I'm working more sources on this and giving the Corps a chance to respond, so you won't see the final version of the story for another 36 hours. But I'll scan some of the docs and try to post them when I push this one live so you can determine for yourselves what's going on...

-- Christian

CV-22 to Deploy for African Exercises

The U.S. Air Force is deploying its first CV-22 Osprey aircraft to Africa next month, according to Air Force Special Operations Command officials.

The aircraft will participate in Flintlock 09, an exercise in the trans-Saharan region of the continent intended to help African nations patrol their own territory, according to a command statement. With poor road systems and vast distances to travel on the continent, the Bell-Boeing CV-22 is seen as well suited to provide the speed and reach needed for such missions.

These missions will employ the CV-22's unique defenses and terrain-following radar, and will differ starkly from those of the Marine Corps, which is operating the MV-22 in western Iraq.

Air Force Special Operations Command currently has nine CV-22s in its young fleet, including five here at Hurlburt (with a sixth expected soon) and four at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. for training, says Brig. Gen. Bradley Heithold, the command's director of plans, programs, requirements and assessments.

The CV-22 recently completed the initial operational test and evaluation (IOT&E) period, and a final report is being written. However, command officials wanted to press the aircraft into service as soon as possible to support activities abroad. Meanwhile, the last MH-53 Pave Low helicopter, the CV-22's predecessor, is retiring this month. CV-22 initial operational capability is expected next year.

The aircraft will also deploy with the Suite of Integrated Radio Frequency Countermeasures (SIRFC) defensive system.

Read the rest of this story, see why PEO Soldier is looking for input, check out some Pope buzzin' and find out where to look for your robot gas monkey from our Aviation Week friends at Military.com.

-- Christian

EXCLUSIVE: Osprey Takes First Rescue Flight in Ike

The CV-22 Osprey got its first encounter with a massive storm on Sept. 11 when it joined several other Air Force planes in an effort to rescue crewmen from a freighter ship in the path of the Hurricane Ike in the Gulf of Mexico.

In the end, all the aircraft had to turn back and the ship's crew rode out the storm, said Lt. Col. Stephanie A. Holcombe, director of public affairs for Air Force Special Operations Command.

Two Ospreys, along with an MH-53 Pave Low, an MC-130W and an MC-130 P were ordered to the mission around 11 a.m. on Sept. 11 after getting the report earlier about the stranded oil freighter named Antalina. The mission was launched after the Coast Guard requested Air Force help with the rescue, Holcombe said.

The ship was reported to be floating without power about 12 miles southeast of Galveston, Texas. However, the ship in fact did have power, according to Holcombe. The Air Force planes carried four rescue crews made up of three pararescuemen and a combat controller.

But as the Ospreys encountered winds in excess of 100 miles an hour they had to turn back. Those same winds prevented the Coast Guard from extending its rescue hoists from their own HH-60 helicopters, according to reports, prompting them to ask the Air Force for help.

-- Bryant Jordan

MV-22 Used for SOF Training

I'm surprised no one else caught this...or maybe they did and I'm dim...

On a cloudless summer day at Camp Mackall Airfield, the U.S. Army reached a new milestone in its airborne operations capabilities with the MV-22 Osprey aircraft July 22.

The operation marked the first official use of the Osprey by the Army for training purposes, said Marine Lt. Col. Baron A. Harrison, Marine liaison at the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, N.C.

Until now, the Osprey had seen use by the U.S. Navy, Marines and Air Force, but not the Army. Because it is still a relatively new aircraft – the Osprey’s first flight was in spring of 1989 – the Army had not shown a great deal of interest.

However, this appears to be changing, said Maj. Steven B. Weliver, airborne commander for the operation.

I know that AFSOC folks are tinkering with the Osprey out at Edwards, but I think it's fairly significant that Army SOF got to take a ride in it ... and jump out of it.

It's interesting too because even the staunchest critics of the Osprey grudgingly accept the bird as tailor made for the SOF. It was, actually, designed in response to the failure at Desert One, so that makes perfect sense from an historical standpoint. But I guess I hadn't thought about whether snake eaters had taken many rides in the things. Maybe this one will have been more influential than McCain's or Obama's Iraq joyrides...

The highlight of the Osprey, and the key to what makes it particularly interesting to USASOC, is its tilt-rotor engine. This dynamic engine enables the Osprey to transition mid-flight from operating very much like a helicopter to propelling through the sky as though it were a plane.

In addition to its ability to take off like a helicopter, the Osprey’s top speed nearly doubles that of traditional rotary wing aircraft, such as the CH-47 Chinook.

“It can get us farther, faster, so basically less exposure to any threats,” Weliver said.

The clear benefit is in extracting troops from a limited and confined space, said Staff Sgt. Eduardo F. Collado, secretary of the general staff at USASOC.

But the Osprey was not always a proven method of travel. It was only recently that the evolution of the Osprey has earned the kind of credibility that catches the Army’s interest, said Weliver.

“The Osprey program has matured to a point where now we can start seeing what its capabilities are and how it will lend itself to the Special Operations community,” he said.

Even so, until a proper number of Soldiers are familiar with safety protocol while aboard the Osprey, it will remain only a potentially useful tool. This jump was among the first substantive steps in incorporating the Osprey into future Army operations.

(Gouge: Shadowspear)

-- Christian

Obama MV-22 Flight Update

OK, so according to Marine Public Affairs, I was wrong...or should I say the veteran crew chief who told me during one of my flights in the Osprey was wrong.

Turns out, Obama was picked up at LZ Washington in the Green Zone in the MV-22. He was flown to Ramadi, where he met with tribal sheiks there who were part of the Anbar Awakening movement. Then he reboarded the Osprey and flew to Amman.

This is logical on several levels. First, if he's going to a Marine AO for meetings with Anbar officials, it stands to reason the Corps would pick him up in an Osprey rather than a 46. The trip is faster and at a higher altitude, so at least tactically, it's safer. Also, the Osprey is the most capable aircraft for the long trip from Ramadi to Amman. A 46 would suck for that distance and the 53 wouldn't be a whole lot better. And you can't land a C-130 at Ramadi.

Hence the Osprey flight. Marine officials, though at first skeptical themselves, didn't see a publicity stunt on this one.

But I am curious about the landing at LZ Washington. That LZ is pretty tight (thought I admittedly have really only seen it at night since all of my flights out of there have been at o-dark-thirty). But I vividly remember talking to a veteran Osprey crew chief who was involved in the testing phase of the MV-22 and is now in VMM-263 that the bird couldn't land at Washington because it was too tight.

I stand corrected...

-- Christian

The New Air Force 2?

I'm not sure if anyone else noticed this, but I think it's pretty significant in one way or another.

So, if you take a look at the pictures and video footage of Barack Obama's trip to Amman, Jordan, those of you who are sensitive to this sort of thing might notice something strange about the aircraft he was walking out of. For me, the tip off was the sound the plane was making.

Having spent some time with the squadron, something in my brain told me it wasn't a C-130 and it wasn't a 53 or a 47. "But surely," my consciousness told me, "they wouldn't risk the safety of a presidential candidate on something most 'experts' say is so dangerous..."

Then I pulled out my trusty TiVo remote and confirmed my suspicions.

Obama flew from Iraq to Amman on an MV-22 Osprey from Marine Medium Tiltrotor Transport squadron 162 -- the newest Osprey squadron to deploy to Iraq.

I'm kicking over some rocks as we speak to see if this was by happenstance or by design. Was the Corps strategically placing a potential president in the Osprey to wow him into continued support for the pricey assault support plane?

I'd also be interested to know a bit about the flight plan, since Obama spent his entire day-long trip to Iraq in the Green Zone, which the Osprey can't land in (LZ Washington being too tight for the wide-winged tiltrotor). So he must have flown out of BIAP...by why not in a C-130?

Curiouser and curiouser...But still, kind of a cool trip for the Osprey anyway. And having logged many hours in one myself, I am sure Obama and his entourage were duly impressed with its performance.

[Both photos from the Associated Press via Yahoo News]

-- Christian

MV-22 Engine Problems in Anbar

The Bell Helicopter-Boeing team that builds the V-22 Osprey will hold a press conference Tuesday at the Farnborough Air Show with a number of senior Marine corps officers playing the starring roles, presumably to extol the virtues of the V-22 and its performance in Iraq.

They might not want to volunteer the following recent incident so we'll do it for them. It just so happens that on June 21 a Marine V-22 crew had a serious engine problem forced the crew to quickly find a place to land.

 An internal Marine memorandum sent to us by a source describes
the problem delicately.

WHILE IN FLIGHT, PILOTS NOTICED THAT THE R/H ENGINE TORQUE WOULD NOT GO ABOVE 66 PERCENT. THE AIRCRAFT WAS UNABLE TO HOLD ALTITUDE, AND HAD TO MAKE AN EMERGENCY LANDING IN THE FIELD. AFTER REPLACEMENT OF THE ENGINE, A BOROSCOPE INSPECTION WAS CONDUCTED TO INSPECT THE ENGINE INTERNALLY. IT WAS DISCOVERED THAT COMPRESSOR BLADES WERE DAMAGED FROM POSSIBLE FOD INGESTION. A BOROSCOPE INSPECTION OF THE COMBUSTION CHAMBER SHOWED THAT THE LINER HAD BROKEN
INTO PIECES. THESE PIECES ENTERED INTO THE GAS GENERATOR, CAUSING SIGNIFICANT
DAMAGE.

INTERNAL FAILURE OF THE ENGINE CAUSED FOR A
LOSS OF ALTITUDE CONTROL. THE AIRCRAFT WAS UNABLE TO STABILIZE OR HOLD AN ALTITUDE, AND WAS FORCED TO LAND. THIS COULD BE FATAL TO PERSONNEL ABOARD THE AIRCRAFT, AND CAUSE DETRIMENTAL DAMAGE TO THE AIRCRAFT. THE MISSION WAS ABORTED DUE TO THE FAILURE.

In other words, the engine was breaking up. Not a good thing. But what’s more interesting is the indication that the troubled engine was still putting out considerable thrust, but the aircraft couldn’t maintain altitude. The V-22 is supposed to be able to fly at least some distance and land on just one engine, but in this case it was unable to hold altitude while still getting significant power from the damaged engine.

 We asked the Marines for comment on this incident and this
is what they said:

An MV-22 Osprey executed a precautionary landing June 21 in al Anbar province due to mechanical problems. Shortly after departing a forward operating base, engine problems prompted the crew to land the aircraft.

No personal injury or damage to the aircraft was sustained.  The aircraft was repaired onsite and flew back to Al Asad Air Base without incident. Hostile fire was not involved.

The cause of the mechanical problem is currently being investigated.

Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 162 is currently in their third month of deployment here at Al Asad Air Base.  This is the first incident of its kind involving the MV-22 Osprey in Iraq.

The aircraft continues to complete its mission as designed and prove its value as an essential asset to the Marine Corps' mission in Iraq.

"This environment is challenging for every aircraft
here in Iraq,"
said Lt. Col. Karsten Heckl, commanding officer, VMM-162.  "The
maintenance Marines of VMM-162 have done an outstanding job keeping the Osprey in the fight through
preventative and routine maintenance."

We should point out a couple of things. One, it may have been the first precautionary (can you say emergency) landing due to an engine failure, there have been a number of incidents of rapid, unscheduled stops due to failed gearbox oil cooling systems, as reported in March by the Star-Telegram.

Second, the Marines have acknowledged publicly that they're wearing out V-22 engines far faster than anyone expected, both in the desert sands of Iraq and the far milder climes of the US.

-- Bob Cox

Bell Bearish on 609

Defense Tech friend and contributor Bob Cox of the Fort Worth Star Telegram has been a Bell-Boeing/Osprey/tiltrotor watchdog for years. His latest story is quite a scoop and looks like a crushing blow to the civilian tiltrotor industry in which Bell had invested a lot of effort and hope.

Bell Helicopter spent a half-century developing tilt-rotor technology and the V-22 Osprey, but the company’s once-enthusiastic commitment to build a similar aircraft for the civilian market seems to have diminished considerably.

The company doesn’t see a promising market in the U.S. for the BA609 tilt-rotor aircraft and has shifted a larger share of the continuing development work to its Italian joint-venture partner, AgustaWestland.

Bell will continue to provide personnel and some funding for continued development and testing of the BA609, but Mike Blake, executive vice president of programs for the company, said AgustaWestland will provide more capital and take the lead in completing flight testing and production of the aircraft.

"I think Bell will always be involved in the 609 program in some way," he said in an interview with the Star-Telegram. "How is to be determined."

Officials of the two companies met recently and agreed on the latest revision to the development plan and timetable, Blake said. Test aircraft three and four have been delivered to AgustaWestland, which will now operate three of the four test planes. Bell will continue test flights of the first aircraft from its Xworkx facility in Arlington.

A six- to nine-passenger aircraft, the BA609 was designed to take advantage of tilt-rotor technology to provide an aircraft for government and private-sector users that combines airplane speed with the vertical takeoff and landing capability of a helicopter.

When the Bell-Agusta alliance was formed in 1998, company officials advertised the BA609 as a $10 million aircraft and said they had 68 orders. Now they have about 80 orders, many of them on the books for a decade. No firm price is quoted publicly, but numbers in the range of $15 million to $20 million each are tossed about within the industry.

Publicly, Bell officials continued to voice support for the program. But privately it’s another matter.

Again, as you all know I'm a proponent of tiltrotor technology and think that opposition to it has become almost like a religion. And with the bleak history of the V-22, who can blame them.

But to me if the civilian version of the V-22 can't get any traction then it seems that tiltrotors still have a long way to go before they can be considered viable alternatives to rotorcraft. And I guess cost and convenience would have to play a large role as well.

Good on Bob for keeping Bell honest.

-- Christian

More Guns Good

Sorry folks, been on vacation with my family for a few days, but back up now...

On Friday I attended a press conference at the Pentagon -- I called it an end zone dance -- where the Marine Corps talked about its successful deployment to Iraq with its first Osprey squadron.

They've already replaced the VMM-263 with another squadron and the press conference -- which surprisingly lasted about an hour -- was pretty standard stuff.

One thing that the Corps' chief of aviation Lt. Gen. George Trautman said was that the service "had an all-aspect, all-quadrant weapon system" on the Osprey "since the very beginning."

"The reason we don't have an all-aspect gun on this platform is because it's hard to do. Okay? So it's more than just weight with regard to the chin gun.

"I've got a lot of time flying Cobras, and the Cobra is the only helicopter in the Marine Corps that has a forward-firing gun. It is not an easy proposition, even in the Cobra.

Well, SOCOM said the same thing, and it looks like they're getting what they want. BAE Systems has developed an underbelly gun for the spec ops version of the Osprey. And though some claim the mechanism makes the V-22s cargo cabin tighter, Trautman had positive things to say about the design and its ability to track the entire circumference of flight.

"The system that we're looking at now, with the Special Operations Command, is an all-aspect weapon that would be mounted in the belly of the aircraft.

"I actually have a better degree of confidence about this than I've had about any other approach that we've taken. And if it comes out the way that we hope that it will come out -- and I actually have some degree of confidence that it will -- Special Operations Command will have this all-aspect weapon mounted, and they intend to deploy with it early in the fall.

And that brings up another interesting point...So is AFSoc going to deploy with the Osprey in the Fall of '08? There's some rumor that SOCOM wants to deploy with the bird early, so was Trautman showing SOCOM's hand?

We can rehash the whole argument over why the Corps left an all-aspect gun out of their current design, but in the end, it sure goes against the Marines' culture to leave one off. As VMM-263 CO Lt. Col. Paul Rock said:

"Well, I mean, never ask a Marine if you wouldn't want more guns on his airplane. I mean, you know, that's kind of, I mean, more guns is good."

-- Christian

Osprey Fire Injures Marine

DT friend and Osprey investigative reporter for the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram Bob Cox sent me an alarming note today. Turns out a V-22 at New River caught fire in the nacelle a month ago and no one seemed to catch it until now (yep, not until after the $10 billion contract award for 167 new MV-22s). According to Bob's investigation, this isn't a new problem.

And it looks like there's still more concern about an oil cooling system that's malfunctioning, risking gear box damage.
From the Star-Telegram's Sky Talk blog:

Just two weeks prior to that award, yet another Osprey operated by Marines in North Carolina suffered an engine nacelle fire, a recurring problem. The good folks at Amarillo.com backed into the story a few days ago with a nice story on a local Marine who had to be hospitalized for inhaling too much fire suppressant while extinguishing the blaze.

No word yet on the degree of damage to the aircraft, which was apparently on ground at the time preparing to take off. A similar fire a few months ago, that broke out in flight and required an emergency landing in the middle of nowhere, essentially destroyed the engine nacelle -- the compartment on the end of the wing that contains the jet turbine engine -- and left the wing itself in very bad shape, according to both Marine and Bell sources.

The Marines have had a number of these fires over the last couple of years but fortunately none have caused a crash. No word on whether there have been any fires involving V-22s in Iraq, which were the first to have a nacelle fire prevention fix installed. What happens is hydraulic and other flammable fluids leak inside the nacelle and then get ignited by hot engine components.

The Marines have acknowledged that the Osprey's reliability in Iraq (and stateside) continues to be less than desired and now have said the aircraft's engines are wearing way too fast. Then this week we learned of another significant problem that has popped up in Iraq.

It seems that the oil cooling system that supplies both a generator and one of the tilt-rotor gearboxes has a nasty tendency to go bad, allowing temperatures to rise to levels that could damage the gear box components. On four occasions V-22s at forward bases were grounded until repairs could be made. generators aboard the aircraft has a problem with its oil cooling system.

An internal Marine memorandum says it has been very fortunate that the cooling system hasn't failed in flight and forced a flight crew to make an emergency landing in hostile territory. The memo says the oil cooling system is lasting just 25 percent of its expected life.

All I can say is that when I spoke with maintainers, pilots, crew chiefs and squadron officials in Iraq, nothing like this came up. They mentioned slip ring failures and avionics hiccups from the fine dust, but nothing as alarming as nacelle fires and oil cooling system failures.

And a Marine spokesman told me the fire on March 14 happened because someone neglected to remove an engine intake cover. I should have more on this later.

So, thanks again to Bob Cox for the head's up.

-- Christian

Our Very Own Osprey Vid

A little shameless self promotion here folks, but as you know in January I spent a few days embedded with VMM-263, the first MV-22 squadron deployed to combat.

As my previous story subtly indicates, I was pretty impressed with the aircraft and was happier to fly 250 mph at 9,000 feet than 150 mph at 300 feet in a war zone situation. Even with the lack of armament -- which we can argue about later -- it seemed a lot safer going fast and high, than slow and low.

Well, I finally put together a video from the footage I shot doing a day of missions with a two ship formation. I posted it on Military.com's Shock and Awe sight, but I also wanted to show you all so you could slice and dice the performance.

I hope you enjoy it.

-- Christian

Osprey Finally Gets Multi-Year Plan

We just got word through the grapevine that a V-22 multi-year plan has been reached between Bell-Boeing and the government. The plan guarantees a buy of 167 Ospreys for $10.4 billion. That's about $62 million per aircraft, which is above the unit flyaway target of $58 million, but considerably down from the $72 million or so price of recent years.

This multi-year plan has been in works for years. Sticky points were the wording of the commitment letter and the details surrounding "reopeners" - the caveats that would allow the government to renegotiate the terms in the future.

Meanwhile, word from the front is the V-22 has morphed into the VIP transport of choice due to its speed and smooth ride. (Even John McCain was ferried around in one during his recent visit.)

(Gouge - SC)

-- Ward

The MV-22 Bradley?

I know that Christian loves the Osprey. I know that lots of people love the Osprey. And what's not to love, right? It's a plane! It's a helicopter! It's a tilt-rotor aircraft! And believe me you, there is nothing worse than having to choose between one or the other and ALWAYS having to have both around. SUCH a drag.) And now it is an armed plane/helicopter! Who says we can't have it all?

Dave Adamiak of BAE Systems explains more about this new addition to America's uber-aircraft:

The major factor in determining what weapon with which to fit the Osprey was size limitation, he said.

The entire system needed to fit into two holes in the aircraft's floor, each known as a "hell hole," which is used to attach cables to external cargo, such as a Humvee, Adamiak explained.

Weapon systems such as the .50-caliber machine gun were simply too big to fit in the space available, he said.

The weapon system weighs between 700 and 800 pounds, meaning the Osprey will have two to three fewer seats for troops, Adamiak said.

Wait a minute. Where have I heard this before?

That's when I realized that the Osprey is like the M2 Bradley of the skies.

Did anyone here ever see "The Pentagon Wars"? It was an HBO movie loosely based upon USAF Col. James Burton's book about his years at the Pentagon in the early 1980s. Although the movie is about the politics of defense acquisitions more generally (from the 1950s onward), it also about the "Bradley Fighting Vehicle" specifically. The Bradley went through many manifestations, starting out as a troop carrier, evolving into a tank, attempting to be amphibious at one point, and ultimately becoming the "fighting vehicle" that we know it as today.

As an aside, lest you think the Pentagon Wars is not worth watching, consider the following:

[Conversation after redesigning the Bradley to carry a gun turret]

Col. Robert Laurel Smith: That's one hell of a cannon.

Jones: That's the problem.

Col. Robert Laurel Smith: What is?

Jones: You go out on the battlefield with this pecker sticking out of your turret, and the enemy's going to unload on you with everything they got. Might as well put a big red bulls eye on the side.

Col. Robert Laurel Smith: But it's a troop carrier, not a tank.

Jones: Do you want me to put a sign on it in fifty languages, "I am a troop carrier, not a tank. Please don't shoot at me?"

I see a sequel coming.

-- Carissa Picard

UPDATE: Bell DOES Hire V-22 Critic

And Lappos pops his head above radar to confirm (thanks to DT reader Chris for the tip):

From the Professional Pilots Rumor Network...

Thanks to all for the kind words, and special thanks to the pprune moderators, who allowed me to make the transition without fear as one heartless and witless ppruner tried to saw off the limb I was on before the next limb was within reach!

Yes, Gulfstream is a great place to work, and I honestly planned to work there for years, until retirement, but the opportunity that Bell offered was just too grand to pass up. The advancement is wonderful, but so is the promise of working with some of the industry's finest on projects that make my head spin. Research and Development was my dream on the first resume that I prepared back when I graduated from Georgia Tech (Go Jackets!) back in 1973, and is now an essential part of my career.

Yes, Avnx EO, the challenge will be to make it work within the confines of today's corporate America, but I do think the team Dick M has built is a powerhouse - I am willing to bet my career on it! I am also betting on a group of very dedicated engineers and pilots who only ask for someone to get them the resources, constancy and support to make things happen. I believe loyalty goes up and down, and that a leader owes his folks to work as hard as possible to get them what they need to make new things happen. I know that some doubt my desire to develop tilt rotors. To them I say that we must please our customers, who demand more speed than we now deliver. I know that, and I stand ready to learn what those grizzly professionals want to teach me about flying at 300 knots.

I also think that research lies in smaller things, systems and technologies that do not stun, and don't make the Sunday newspaper. Sometimes we feel compelled to develop the better blade, and better transmission, and we forget that a failed microswitch, a missed approach or blown oil seal can spell financial disaster for our customers. Our technological progress has big leaps and small victories, and I would like put together a team that can hit both chip shots and long drives.

-- Christian

Rumor Mill: Bell Might Hire V-22 Critic

Sent over from close DT friend and Ft. Worth Star-Telegram gumshoe, Bob Cox:

The rumor and gossip mill at Bell Helicopter has been running at warp speed the last few days over reports the company may hire a former top official of rival Sikorsky Aircraft Co. to take over as senior vice president of engineering and head of Bell's Xworkx research and development lab.

The suggestion that Bell may hire Nick Lappos, now an executive with Gulftream Aerospace but formerly an engineer, test pilot and head of the effort to sell Sikorsky's S-92 to the U.S. armed forces, has stirred up a tempest among old line Bell loyalists.

Some Bell employees and former employees have reportedly written letters to senior management at the company urging reconsideration if Lappos is indeed being considered for a Bell post.

Bell and Sikorsky have long been competitors and rivals, at times less than friendly. Lappos, who is well respected by many in the helicopter world, has earned the enmity of many Bell loyalists because of his past criticisms of the V-22 Osprey and Bell's other tilt-rotor aircraft development efforts including the BA609 civil tilt-rotor.

Lappos has not returned telephone calls and e-mails from the Star-Telegram. Bell officials have declined to comment on "any personnel matters."

Bell has hired several other former Sikorsky officials in recent years including Mike Blake, now executive vice president of the Fort Worth company. One industry official said Lappos is an excellent engineer and works well with other people and would have little problem renouncing his past criticisms of the V-22 to go to work for Bell.

-- Bob Cox

[EDITOR: Thanks Bob!]

Osprey Gets Its Gun

I know there's some debate around these parts on whether or not the Osprey is combat effective with or without a defensive weapon.

We all know the MV-22 has a ramp-mounted gun pointing aft, which gives the plane very little in the way of fire supression in a hot LZ (that is, if the gun works. On my last flight on the Osprey in Iraq one of the planes' guns malfunctioned)...

My impression from flying around in several Ospreys in Iraq is that the speed and agility make up for a lack of defensive firepower...you don't see a door gun on a C-130 do you? But I can still understand why the SOF community wants a little more bang bang given its mission. And it seems to me that if you can then why don't you put a lead-spitting gatling gun on the darn thing. Better safe than sorry, I say.

So BAE Systems has been working with the SOF CV-22 folks to design a defensive weapon that sits under the Osprey's belly and can swing 360 degrees for covering fire. They just sent me a release yesterday that showed the company is well on its way to flight testing the gun, a modified GAU-2B minigun. It's an version of the company's Remote Guardian system which is intended for a variety of rotary aircraft in the US inventory.

I know our friends at Aviation Week reported the official "unveiling" of the system last fall at Modern Day Marine, but this marks the first time the system has been installed on an actual plane, readying it for the first test flight and aerial fire...

(PHOTO: BAE Systems)

-- Christian

More "Osprey in Iraq" News

The lede article at Military.com this morning is Christian's more formalized report about his time with VMM-263 in Iraq. Here's a sniff:

The Marine Corps moved heaven and earth to get them here. An amphibious assault ship was commandeered specifically to carry the New River, N.C.-based squadron halfway around the world to the most dangerous war zone on the planet.

And there was a lot riding on this deployment. Billions of dollars were spent over nearly three decades on a technology that many said would never work. And its track record -- at least in the early years -- wasn’t very good.

But the Corps’ most high-profile program is finally deployed, and from the looks of it, the MV-22 Osprey tiltrotor transport is living up to its promise.

So are we all believers now?

Read the entire article here.

-- Ward

Osprey. Period.

I just got off the flight line from a day aboard "Steadfast 04," an MV-22 Osprey from the New River, N.C.-based Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 263 deployed here at al Asad air base in Iraq. I'm putting together a longer story about my day and interviews I had with crew, maintainers and commanders with the squadron, but here are my preliminary impressions.

You ride one, you'll never want to go back to anything else. Period.

It just so happened that my flight from Fallujah to al Asad was on an Osprey. I was jammed in there with about ten other pax, their gear and a box full of supplies they call "tri-walls" for their three-ply cardboard construction. The guy next to me was a SEAL who's working here training Iraqi army troops. It was his first time on an Osprey.

Shouting over the engine noise, I asked him what he thought. He beamed a huge smile and gave a hardy thumbs up. Then he told me...

"I've ridden on CH-53s about five times before...it takes forEVER," he shouted as we sped across the blackened desert. That three-engined beast is really the only thing comparable in this AO to the Osprey (the Army's CH-47 is a good comparison too) but the MV-22 blows the Super Stallion out of the water in this medium lift role.

The performance of the Osprey compared to the helicopter it's replacing -- the CH-46 Sea Knight -- is like night and day. The most dramatic thing you notice here in a "combat" environment is the extreme altitude gain and loss the MV-22 can pull. It literally jumps off the landing pad and within seconds goes nose high and skyrockets to anywhere between 5,000 and 9,500 feet. The pull up and nose down to the LZ can be so jarring you think you're going to fall out the back...and the pressure on your ears is borderline painful.

"Make sure their heads aren't exploding," said Steadfast 04 co-pilot, Capt. Lee York, to his crew chief, Gunnery Sgt. Mike Brodeur.

"They're okay, sir," came Brodeur's voice over the intercom as he surveyed the wide-eyed Marines sitting along the Osprey's bulkhead.

My ears still haven't come back to normal.

-- Christian

(Cross-posted at my "From the Front" blog.)

War-zone Ospreys Okay So Far

Our old friend the semi-retired Rick Whittle had a chance to peek behind the curtain raised by VMM-263 recently and he filed this report currently running in the headlines at Military.com.

Here are a few highlights from Rick's story:

So far, the Osprey has defied the dire predictions of its most severe critics. Citing the V-22's record of four crashes and 30 deaths in test flights prior to 2001, some foes of the tiltrotor forecast more crashes and deaths in Iraq.

As of Dec. 28, three months through a scheduled seven-month deployment, the 23 pilots of Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 263, known as VMM-263, had logged 1,639 hours of flight time in Iraq, carried 6,826 passengers and delivered 631,837 pounds of cargo without a mishap or even a close call.

Headquartered at Al Asad, an isolated air base in the desert about 110 miles west of Baghdad, VMM-263's Ospreys spent their first two months in Iraq largely flying "general support" missions - hauling troops and supplies to and from forward operating bases.

Even one of the usual suspects, Phil Coyle, was uncharacteristically sanguine about the V-22's performance to date:

"As long as they keep using it like a truck, I think they'll probably be okay," said Philip Coyle, a former Pentagon weapons testing director and a longtime Osprey critic.

The article mentions the various missions that "Thunder Chicken" aircraft have been involved in, including an ersatz combat mission called "aeroscout."

While one could argue that the 50 percent FMC rate that skipper Rock throws out in passing is a scary stat, the other data looks promising. Also no mishaps are better than some mishaps. In any case, we'll reserve judgement until Christian has a chance to take a firsthand look in a few weeks.

-- Ward

New Mission for MV-22 in Iraq

My close friend and former Marine Corps Times colleague Gordon Lubold had the opportunity to travel to Iraq with Marine Commandant Gen. James Conway over Thanksgiving last week. He now works for the Christian Science Monitor and had a remarkable trip - getting a few great scoops.

But he was also the first reporter to have filed a dispatch from the first operational MV-22 Osprey squadron, VMM-263.

It's a short piece, but we'll keep our eyes out for more coverage as the Corps begins to chip away at its self-imposed media blackout.

Washington and Bahgdad - The US Marine Corps' MV-22 Osprey, the tilt rotor plane that flies like both a helicopter and a plane, is expected to face one of its biggest tests ever this month, flying combat missions for the first time – a major milestone in the Osprey's long history of ups and downs.

After years of investment, controversy, and tragedy, the Osprey finally debuted this fall in Iraq, a low-key deployment of 10 planes that marks the beginning of the Corps' gradual replacement of aging Vietnam-era helicopters.

Commanders have limited the plane's operations to simpler logistical roles. But now it is set to fly combat missions in Anbar Province, where marines are deployed, that will test the plane's ability to maneuver in more sophisticated and dangerous combat missions. The awkward-looking hybrid has two large propellers mounted on nacelles that swing up and down to allow it to take off and land like a helicopter and to fly like a plane. The Osprey's deployment to Iraq has already shown that some components of the complex plane wear-out faster than others. But generally, it's so far, so good, says the Corps' top officer.

"It's a learning experience, and that's why we deployed it here, and part of it was to be able to see just how it performs in combat," says Commandant Gen. James Conway, during a recent trip to Iraq to see the Osprey. General Conway says there is still much to learn, but that he likes what he sees. "What I saw ...is that it is going very well."

The Corps has staked much on the future of the Osprey, which has taken decades to develop and is blamed for the deaths of 23 marines in two separate accidents in 2000. Despite the high-profile nature of the plane, Corps officials have played down its arrival in Iraq this fall.

That may change as marines prepare to employ it in a series of missions called "Aeroscout," in which they use ground and air assets to swarm suspected insurgent and terrorist targets, says Marine Lt. Gen. George Trautman, who heads the Corps' aviation division. General Trautman says the Osprey, which flies faster and farther than the CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter it replaces, will allow Corps commanders to conduct more combat missions than they could before.

Trautman conceded that the combat role for the Osprey would be somewhat limited, as much of the insurgency has left the once-dangerous province. Currently, the Osprey is used for "assault support," says one official in Iraq.

But early on in its deployment that began in October, one plane had to make an emergency landing in Jordan and daily reports showed that its "readiness rates" had slipped to as low as 40 percent on one day – 50 percent on two other days. Those lower rates were largely driven by a dearth of replacement parts when Corps officials saw how some components wore out faster in the desert climes of Iraq, where the sand is finer than almost anywhere in the US. Now that Marine officials have been able to identify those parts and get sufficient replacements in stock in Iraq, those readiness rates have climbed back up to close to what Corps officials say is a more comfortable 80 percent.

"It's one thing to use engineering models and forecasting, and it's another to actually run the airplane in that environment," says Trautman. "You're on a learning journey, there is no doubt about that."

Recent media criticism of the plane included the concern that it has no side- or front-mounted weapons systems, leaving it vulnerable to attack. But Trautman says the Corps is looking at a belly-mounted, "all-aspect" gun that would have a 360-degree firing capability.

[Photo from The Christian Science Monitor]

-- Christian

EXCLUSIVE: First Video of Osprey in Iraq

An inside source over in Iraq shot me a note yesterday with a link that shows a Marine-produced video telling the story of their assistance in securing routes for Iraqis traveling to the Haaj.

But in it - about half way through - is the first known footage of the Osprey on a deployment. It's just a quick shot, but we'll call it a "proof of life" that the MV-22 is indeed deployed to Iraq and can land safely in the desert (sarcasm).

Also, my bro in Iraq joked with me that he took a ride on an Osprey the other day to the town of Qaim. It was his first time in an Osprey and he was a serious skeptic. On his way back to base, he had to fly aboard a CH-53 and he told me he kept thinking to himself "what the hell is taking so long..." The Osprey's performance changed his mind, as it did for me when I took a ride in one.

Enjoy the footage as you rest up from yesterday's thanksgiving feast.

-- Christian

AFSOC V-22 Set for Major Tests Next Month

The program director for the Air Force spec ops version of the V-22 said Tuesday the tiltrotor aircraft should begin initial operational test and evaluation flights by late October or early November.

Col. Tarik Abboushi said at a breakfast meeting with reporters he’s drawing upon prior testing by the Marine Corps to get their MV-22 operational to help inform his test regime, but added he’s concentrating on working through the integration of key subsystems, including terrain-following radar, defensive countermeasures and navigation systems.

Abboushi also said AFSOC has issued a requirement for an “all-quadrant gun.” Currently the CV-22 uses a ramp-mounted weapon system for defensive fire. Abboushi said it was unclear whether the all-quadrant gun would require design changes, but he said he's pretty sure major changes will probably not be needed.

The CV-22 is expected to breeze through IOT&E for a go-ahead by Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center to enter into initial operational capability with AFSOC in early 2009, Abboushi said.

-- Christian