Re: Airborne lasers

From: Earl Colby Pottinger (earlcp_at_idirect.com)
Date: 11/19/04 

Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 16:38:23 -0600

henry@spsystems.net (Henry Spencer) :

> In article <10ps8oj5h7m7gbf@corp.supernews.com>,
> Pat Flannery <flanner@daktel.com> wrote:
> >>Say a crew of 12, at $50/hour, is another $50M/year.
> >
> >This is the Air Force we are dealing with; have faith- they can make it
> >cost three times that much. The expensive part isn't the ABL's
> >operations- it's the fighter escort that will really eat up the dollars.
>
> In the long run, the expensive part is the wear and tear on the ABL
> aircraft -- an extremely costly asset (far more expensive than the
> escorts) with a limited working life.

Why would the ABL plane suffer a lot of wear? Does it not run at best
cruising speed most of the time? Would seem it would not be under alot of
stress during standby. Or are you talking about the laser assembly? The
mirror assembly probably takes a real beating from every pulse.

                  Earl Colby Pottinger
   

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