Thus far we’ve covered almost all of the weapons available for use by the Su-25T. Today we’ll take a look at two we haven’t seen yet to wrap up our exploration. Our flight profile this afternoon will take us northeast out of Gudauta where we will hop inland on the other side of a ridge to accomplish a combined strike against two targets.
The first target is a power line transformer building which we will approach along an east-west valley. The target building sits very near the confluence of two branches of a river so be on the lookout for that as an aiming point. A zoomed in view of the satellite view also shows building relative the fork in the river.
We will use a medium altitude weapons delivery against the transformer station before we descend rapidly into a valley that shoots off to the south. We can recognize this valley because the same river we used to locate the first target will lead us out of the area to the south. As we exit the foothills of the mountains we will want to remain low since SAM units are active along the coastal plains.
The second target is a nuclear power station that we will strike while we egress toward the sea. The main targets are
not the cooling stacks since they are only concrete and destroying them wouldn’t really destroy the “heart” of the station. Our targets are the buildings occupying the center of the facility where the nuclear reactors are actually housed.
Our mission loadout for the strike will consist of two KAB-500kr TV-guided bombs for use against the transformer building (strike #1) and six FAB-500 dumb bombs for use against the nuclear facility. The FAB-500 is basically similar to a U.S. 1000 lb. bomb (Mk83) and the KAB-500kr is basically an FAB-500 with an electro-optical guidance kit added on (similar to the U.S. GBU-16) to make it a “smart” bomb. We’ve also reduced the fuel load to 50% since this sortie is so short.
Keep in mind this is only a training exercise so enemy defenses are relatively soft (no multiple tiered air defenses). It is also worth noting that normally an attack such as this would be carried out with wingmen and a large escort package consisting of SEAD, and CAP flights.
Just prior to take off I turn on my “Fantasmagoria” ECM pod and note the green light illuminates on the right side of the panel (thanks Viper!). I don’t know if it is just a placebo light, but I guess it can’t hurt either.
Roaring off down the runway we head out to the northeast. The first few waypoints are setup for proper guidance up the initial valley and up to an attack altitude for the first strike target. The altitude is high enough for delivery of the KAB-500 but low enough to allow terrain masking from the SAM threat south of the ridges.
At waypoint #2 we take a big right turn to the east which lines us up pointing toward a prominent peak prior to the target area. We want to pass just to the north (left side) of this peak to line us up with the target area.
As we pass near the peak we’ll climb slightly higher. I would suggest after passing waypoint #3 to put the aircraft in level flight autopilot so that you can work the targeting solution without distraction.
We switch to air-to-ground mode (7) and cycle to the KAB-500 (D). Also turn on the “Shkval” targeting system (O) and be sure to adjust the target size bracket to the appropriate size for buildings (60) (CTRL+ or CTRL- or ALT+ or ALT-). Since the target has been predesignated a small diamond will appear over the general area. I like to slew my designator circle over that area and hit designate once to stabilize the camera before zooming in and looking for the specific aiming point.
Once the target building becomes clear I settle the aiming point on it. Employing the KAB-500 I’ve found that sometimes you need a solid lock on the target (indicated by an ‘AC’ in the TV monitor) and sometimes you don’t (indicated by a ‘KC’). It seems like a quirky system that can be frustrating to use on occasion. As you approach the target the familiar horizontal arrow starts moving down the range scale on the left side of the HUD. Once the range is between the two tick marks on the scale you will get a launch authorization (LA).
I jab the pickle button twice and my two KAB-500 bombs fall from the racks.
Since the bombs are “fire and forget” (they self guide to the target) I can dump the nose, chop the throttle and extend the speedbrakes to dive toward the valley floor. The plan is to enter the valley as it turns to the right ahead and follow the river out toward the plains.
The bombs track in nicely on the target and if one is enough, two is even better. The building collapses in a tangle of wires as I descend past it.
Arresting my descent near the valley floor (always an exciting maneuver) I retract the speedbrakes and push the throttles to the stop to accelerate to maximum speed. The plan is to blister out of the valley and build up a ton of kinetic energy that we will use for the next strike waypoint all while flying low enough to avoid being engaged by the SAM defenses. The big right turn into the valley is a gut churning high-G maneuver.
While you are rocketing down the valley (or earlier if you think about it) you can set up your stores panel to release your bombs. I set the bomb interval to .3 seconds to give a bit of distance between the bombs and I accidentally set “NO 4” instead of “BCE” which would have released all of the ordnance at the same time instead of just four bombs.
As we exit the valley I spy my reference visual checkpoint, a smokestack that is very easy to spot even at low altitude.
By the time we reach the smokestack we are blistering along in excess of 800 kph and we start a firm pull-up to about 40 degrees of nose-up pitch and roll to the right in a 45 degree bank angle.
As we soar upward and our speed slowly bleeds off I glance out the right front of the windscreen and can easily spot the nuclear power plant right where I expect it to be (good time for TrackIR!).
Continue rolling to the right until you are completely inverted and looking “up” through the windscreen above your head at the target. You can see the airspeed has bled off and our altitude has peaked at around 2300 meters.
Keeping in a bit of back pressure I pull the nose down until I’m aiming approximately at the target site then I continue rolling to the right until I’m upright. This kind of “pop-up” attack profile is nice because it is a constant positive-G maneuver (your backseater will thank you!) and allows you to keep the target in sight at all times throughout the maneuver. The threat receiver is going crazy now, but we are committed to the attack at this point; our only escape is to deliver the bombs and get out of Dodge.
As we descend toward the target I deploy the speedbrakes and the pipper moves up onto the target complex. I hit the pickle button and hold it while the bombs ripple off. I watch the weapons hardpoint status on the bottom of the HUD and when I see the final two bombs haven’t kicked off (because I stupidly set the release number to “4”) I jab the pickle button again and the final two drop away.
Pulling out of the bottom of my dive the bombs hit behind me stitching across the complex.
The ZSU-23s that are defending the site don’t have much time to respond to my pop-up attack and low-level egress but they take their best crack at me as I zip away to the south.
As I head away at low-level I see a lighthouse landmark that makes a good exit point out to the sea.
With the site engulfed in flames on the distant horizon I allow myself to climb up a bit as we are out of SAM engagement range.
It is a short flight back to base and as I turn final I throw out the approach flaps and am surprised to feel a gentle rolling moment which is easily countered with trim. Despite not feeling any “thuds or bumps” during the attack run it looks like one “Zeus” got some hits on my right wingtip, blowing away a chunk of the aileron and damaging the outboard flap panel resulting in a slight lift (and drag) asymmetry.
Without the use of full flaps I find myself a little “warm” as I try to slow my final approach speed. I touchdown a little hot (about 330 kph) but a little bit of braking gets me into the drag chute deployment speed (under 300 kph) and I’m able to stop with plenty of room to spare.
As I taxi in to the ramp I see the mouth-watering site of a train rattling by the base on an adjacent track; what a juicy target that would be!!
This was a nice short (15 minute) mission with some exciting flying. I flew it a few times while I was designing the mission and had originally intended for the attack on the power transformer building (that’s what I call it anyway) to be a relatively low-level attack but I found the KAB-500 is a bit of a finicky weapon to employ. It has tight release parameters apparently and additionally it seemed like sometimes I could get my targeting optics to lock up the building and sometimes it would fail. I found the higher I flew the better my chances of getting a weapon release. Nothing is more frustrating than seeing the “launch authorized” cue and hitting the pickle button only to find the weapon does not release.
The pop-up attack works really well, although you would be exposed to close in SAM units in a pretty serious way. Obviously a stand-off missile would be a better choice, or maybe a second best choice would be a retarded rocket propelled bomb (BETAB-500SHP) that could be delivered in low-level flight over the target. There are certainly many ways to plan and execute an attack which makes flying these missions all the more interesting.
This mission can be downloaded here: http://www.mudspike.com/lomac/simhq14.zip BeachAV8R
