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Nat Geo - Top Secret

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posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 04:47 PM
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reply to post by Shadowhawk
 
Great work Peter! Enjoyed the episode



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 07:37 PM
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reply to post by Zaphod58
 


Where are the antennas located? That would clear things up in my mind. I'm not being argumentative here, but simply want to understand the situation. And how are these antennas not visible when the plane is in the air?

I've never researched it, but antennas on stealth aircraft have to be at least a minor engineering problem. They aren't big, but an antenna by it's very nature will be a bit reflective to radar. Given the comms are no higher than UHF, I would imagine they could make the antenna somewhat absorbent at radar frequencies. Stealth is an analog game. Nothing is truly 100% stealthy.



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 07:44 PM
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www.lazygranch.com...

Here are the rest of the B-2 photos, including the shot of the airman yawning as he guarded the plane.

Is that an antenna at the back in this shot?



But it is on the bottom , so again, this is confusing.



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 07:53 PM
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reply to post by gariac
 


Aft fuselage, between and near the exhaust. If they are refueling from a tanker, they can retract them prior to the hookup. I don't know why they always did it post landing, when they could have as part of the prelanding checklist, but there may have been a ground check required as well that they didn't tell us about.

All the lights and antennas retract into the fuselage, the lights go flush, the antennas go into the fuselage. The only thing is that then they can't be used. So once they go into "combat mode" (for lack of a better description), they are on their own until they exit the area and can deploy them again.

That looks like a comm antenna on the bottom. I don't think that's what these were. I don't know if they were stealthy or what they did, just that they had to hide them before parking.

edit on 10/13/2012 by Zaphod58 because: (no reason given)



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 07:54 PM
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reply to post by Shadowhawk
 


The webpage is a bit confusing, but there is about two minutes of video of you with the "investigator" at the crash site.

Palmdale surely has its secrets, but I don't know how visible they will be. If the project is secret enough, they will just put the pieces on a cargo plane and go to Groom Lake for final assembly. Big Safari is plenty interesting if they took the job to explain it.

Well I give Nat-Geo credit for not assembling the silly team of investigators, though the obligatory hottie is always appreciated. They did go with the half shaven investigator combined with ominous music theme, which is still part of the cliche.



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 08:03 PM
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reply to post by Zaphod58
 


On a flying wing, I have to scratch my head a bit to delineate the fuselage. ;-) Now the exhaust is on the top, so are we talking about something on top and between the exhaust? But then the flaps only cover the bottom. So I'm still not clear here.

Combat mode makes sense to me. Or perhaps silent running. I have no idea how they bomb in theater. That is, do they have fighter accompaniment? If not, then there really is no one to talk to.

Seems to me they do need a radio to talk to boomer.



posted on Oct, 13 2012 @ 08:08 PM
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reply to post by gariac
 


The fuselage is inboard of the engines. Just outboard of the engines is where the wing join is, so everything inboard from there is fuselage. As far a I know they are only on the top, around the engine exhaust area. They had no problem with me walking all the way to the back of the aircraft, as long as I stayed under it at the back.



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 01:00 AM
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Originally posted by gariac
reply to post by Zaphod58
 


On a flying wing, I have to scratch my head a bit to delineate the fuselage. ;-) Now the exhaust is on the top, so are we talking about something on top and between the exhaust? But then the flaps only cover the bottom. So I'm still not clear here.

Combat mode makes sense to me. Or perhaps silent running. I have no idea how they bomb in theater. That is, do they have fighter accompaniment? If not, then there really is no one to talk to.

Seems to me they do need a radio to talk to boomer.



Alright since you guys nailed it i'll tell you. There's two antenna's on the top of the B-2 in between the engines on the "middle" triangle if that makes sense. You will never see them in a photo unless a boom does something stupid and takes a pic of them
That being said, I don't have any pics of the antenna's because if they can't retract them for some reason they tell us the code for basically "no pics, no passengers" in the boom pod. I don't know what we can learn from them though. But i will say they are about 10"-12" tall. I've seen them out probably three times total. We get a TS clearance for three things, and the B-2 is one of them. If they are out, then taking pictures is strictly prohibited because it becomes a TS status.

Another cool thing is the receptacle. Its a rolling receptacle that they have to tell us when they open it, and they only open it when they are in pre-contact position (about 50 feet). This is because of the stealth. They have to tell us because as soon as they "roll" the receptacle as they call it, our TCAS goes nuts because it wasn't there one second and was the next.

In regards to bombing operations, no I've never seen them with fighter escorts. Why give up their position with non stealth aircraft? Although the F-117 would fly with fighter escorts to a certain point in the bombing run and the fighters would bank off leaving the F-117 to fend for itself. Talking to their pilots, I may have heard through the grape vine that when the fighter escort leaves them, they can't bank more than three degrees on the final bombing run or they are less stealthy. That may be job talk but it did come from a F-117 pilot.

Back to the B-2 in theatre. Depending on what EMCON (or whatever they call it these days) we are operating under depends on what radios we can use. Technically they never have to talk to the tanker all the way to contact. We will be at the point at a certain time and they meet up with us. I have lights on the bottom of the jet to guide them forward, backwards, etc. using a switch in the boom pod. However, once in contact, we have the boom interphone, which is a radio system that runs through the boom and taps into the receiver aircrafts normal intercoms. it allows the boom and the receiver pilot to talk during contact without it being broadcasted everywhere.

One final thing, when we are in contact, we really don't have to talk to the pilot, unless it's like a training sortie back in the states or something and they need some help staying in the envelope. But if it's night time, we have to get the tail numbers of every receiver aircraft we refuel so we can charge that wing. Lots of paperwork...

Hope this helps!
edit on 14-10-2012 by boomer135 because: (no reason given)



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 04:20 PM
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reply to post by boomer135
 


Part of "stealth" is to act stealthy, and that usually involves not flying in a straight line. Now maybe too radical of a turn is also bad. It could be a matter of simply exposing too much of a control surface (flap, rudder). I would bet this is the kind of thing they detect in either static and more likely dynamic RCS.

If you are losing TCAS, then I have to assume this "antenna" is actually some sort of multi-band beast of an antenna. Maybe UHF and L-band. At the very least, they need voice comms for normal flight and need to receive the TACAN on the tanker to find it. If you are building a $2 billion plane, you can afford some clever antenna design. [Paratech has technology to tune antennas on the fly with active components.]

Since it kind of looks like I got a shot of an antenna under the plane, I would guess there is a UHF antenna down there, and per the other post, I presume retractable.

So at the air show, the B-2 will need the top antenna to talk to the tower. It must retract it while taking off since photography is not prohibited when the plane is airborne. And I suppose the lower antenna isn't worth keeping secret since it will be seen from the ground. Then again, I really don't see why the upper antenna needs to be so well guarded.



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 05:48 PM
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reply to post by gariac
 


In these photos you can see it sticking out, it looks like the same thing as the photo posted but not totally sure.

www.aviationnews.eu...

douglawrence.files.wordpress.com...



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 06:19 PM
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Originally posted by Laxpla
reply to post by gariac
 


In these photos you can see it sticking out, it looks like the same thing as the photo posted but not totally sure.

www.aviationnews.eu...

douglawrence.files.wordpress.com...

That's not an antenna underneath, you're referring to. I believe that's the 'belly beacon' or Nav beacon on the underside of the plane, which is used for landing/approach/taxiing.



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 08:08 PM
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Originally posted by Laxpla
reply to post by gariac
 


In these photos you can see it sticking out, it looks like the same thing as the photo posted but not totally sure.

www.aviationnews.eu...

douglawrence.files.wordpress.com...


I don't see the antenna's sticking out where I'm talking about...



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 08:16 PM
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Originally posted by gariac
reply to post by boomer135
 


Part of "stealth" is to act stealthy, and that usually involves not flying in a straight line. Now maybe too radical of a turn is also bad. It could be a matter of simply exposing too much of a control surface (flap, rudder). I would bet this is the kind of thing they detect in either static and more likely dynamic RCS.

If you are losing TCAS, then I have to assume this "antenna" is actually some sort of multi-band beast of an antenna. Maybe UHF and L-band. At the very least, they need voice comms for normal flight and need to receive the TACAN on the tanker to find it. If you are building a $2 billion plane, you can afford some clever antenna design. [Paratech has technology to tune antennas on the fly with active components.]

Since it kind of looks like I got a shot of an antenna under the plane, I would guess there is a UHF antenna down there, and per the other post, I presume retractable.

So at the air show, the B-2 will need the top antenna to talk to the tower. It must retract it while taking off since photography is not prohibited when the plane is airborne. And I suppose the lower antenna isn't worth keeping secret since it will be seen from the ground. Then again, I really don't see why the upper antenna needs to be so well guarded.



No the TCAS has nothing to do with the antenna's that I know of. What I was saying is we can't even pick them up on TCAS until they "roll" the receptacle. Once that happens and they are 50 feet behind us, then our TCAS goes haywire. So by opening the receptacle, they are visable to us on TCAS. When it's closed, we can't see them and get no warnings.

I would venture a guess and say that the antenna's have something to do with having to get presidential authority to drop nukes. They might be some high powered antenna's to keep them in contact with the higher-ups or something. Honestly, I'm throwing out a guess here but how can they get the drop order say in China from when the President gives the go ahead? The B-52 had a system of getting orders from some radio and you can see the entire procedure on "Dr. Strangelove", the movie. Maybe the stealth has the same sort of system that needs some high powered stuff. Notice how subs have EAM message machines? The B-52 does, and it can drop nukes. I bet the B-2 does as well and that might be what it's for.

As for the F-117's flying straight, I can only say that what the pilots said. I don't know for fact that it's true. However, that plane, and the way the faucets are, it makes sense that you would want to fly directly towards your target. If you bank, the RCS might get bigger and maybe something would pick them up. Again I don't know for sure.



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 08:28 PM
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One more thing about the TACAN. They don't need it per se. It's there if they want to use it, but a plane like the B-2 probably has a good radar and can pick us up from far away. A tanker TACAN is probably only good for 100-125 miles or so. Also, it's an Air to Air TACAN and not Air to Ground. Gariac you might know this, but by broadcasting our A/A TACAN, can a ground station pick it up? Again EMCON procedures let us know whether or not to use the TACAN. The first night of OIF, we couldn't use it for a while and AWACS had a hard time telling the fighters and bombers where the tankers were. So we turned them on...
edit on 14-10-2012 by boomer135 because: (no reason given)



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 10:09 PM
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www.lazygranch.com...

There is one good clear shot of a B2 from underneath--the one with the bomb bays open.

Here's what I notice. There are many different panels of odd shapes all in slightly different shades of grey. I'm sure they didn't do this for artistic reasons.

Anyway, look at the underside. On each side, starting halfway down the middle, about where you'd expect the engine exhaust to be on the other side, there a are a number of faint black lines. They look a little bit like dirt.

What are these? My guess, some remnant from contrail suppression fluid.

Then both fore and aft, two each, there are some fairly large diamond shaped panels on each side of the centerline. What are these?



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 11:38 PM
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reply to post by Laxpla
 





I yeah, I've seen that. So there are two antenna ports? But that isn't the back of the plane.

Argh, I need a wall to bang my head on!



posted on Oct, 14 2012 @ 11:50 PM
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reply to post by mbkennel
 


Why would contrail suppression fluid leave a mark underneath the plane? Is it possible those marks are related to some cooling hardware? Just thinking out loud here, if the exhaust is being run on top of the plane, what heat that doesn't get shielded by the "shuttle tiles" on top would flow to the bottom of the plane, so maybe they cool this area to hide the hot spots.

www.globalsecurity.org...

Apparently the B-2 has tanks for such fluid, but the claim is it isn't used.



posted on Oct, 15 2012 @ 12:21 AM
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reply to post by boomer135
 


Have I ever heard a TACAN? No. Could the enemy hear one? Sarah Palin says "you betcha." If you have a bunch of engineers at your disposal, SIGINT on a TACAN wouldn't be very tough. Iran has good engineers, uh considering the number that we educated. ;-)

I suppose I could make a game out of spot the tanker tacan, but I never got the urge to figure out how to do it. DME and TACAN are very wideband. Channel spacing is 1MHz, so the signal bandwidth should be in that neighborhood. It wouldn't be picked up well by your typical communications scanner.

Until recently, I didn't own any wide-band gear. I bought a few used Drake analog satellite receivers that are L-band with very wide filters that can be selected. I could probably sniffed a TACAN in the air now with that gear. Not decode one, but at least see it. These Drakes are like $20 bucks on ebay when they show up.What you want is the Drake ESR1255. It has a fine step in the VFO. There is one on ebay now, though it looks like it had a hard life and the shipping is expensive. I have my share of these (three so I can hack one or two), so I won't compete in the bidding. The manual isn't exactly on the internet, but I can supply one. Drake wants something like $15 for the manual. Every one I bought on ebay worked since they are commercial receivers that sat in earth stations most of their lives.

I'm told the TACAN has a voice channel in it.



posted on Oct, 15 2012 @ 12:25 AM
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Originally posted by gariac
reply to post by mbkennel
 


Why would contrail suppression fluid leave a mark underneath the plane? Is it possible those marks are related to some cooling hardware? Just thinking out loud here, if the exhaust is being run on top of the plane, what heat that doesn't get shielded by the "shuttle tiles" on top would flow to the bottom of the plane, so maybe they cool this area to hide the hot spots.

www.globalsecurity.org...

Apparently the B-2 has tanks for such fluid, but the claim is it isn't used.



Hell that could be anything. Maybe they launch coutermeasures that scratch the bottom or something? Also, Northrop was supposed to put in a contrail suppression system back in the 90's. maybe that is it? And those big diamond panels? Probably just maintenence panels I would imagine.

The problem here is this is one of the most classified aircraft ever built. We will probably never know what that stuff actually is.



posted on Oct, 15 2012 @ 12:39 AM
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reply to post by gariac
 


You can find the TACAN info in the AP1B on your website if you know what to look for.
I'll pm you in a few and then you'll know the TACAN for all the A/R tracks in Red Flag. lol




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