How exactly do fighter pilots discern when they "kill" each other in mock aerial engagements? I imagine in regards to a gun kill it's something like simply tracking the target with the pipper for a pro-longed amount of time but what about the likes of a Fox-2 or 3 shot? Just something I was merely curious about.
Thanks!
Posted May 25, 2015, 8:10 PM UTC
I'm not sure how they determine whether or not a missile "hits", but I know they use dummy missiles that have live seekers. This way they can know if they are within acceptable firing parameters, and probably just assume the missile will hit under ideal conditions.
For guns it's a 3 second gun track or 3 snapshots.
Here you go: http://youtu.be/-w2ogyElvto
Note how the Eagles look like bloated whales, and how an F-16 gets taken out by a Tomcat that was called out to him, after having taken out another Tomcat.
I'm not sure about this, but generally speaking, they will count a kill when the simulated timers time out. Otherwise I think that more sophisticated acmi pods and ground software are able to stimulate them aswell.
I'm not sure they are used in Red Flag and Top Gun, but pilots train in missile use by shooting down drones, usually old planes refurbished for one last flight.
That is super rare.
For gunfights I believe it's usually having a gun tracking solution for X seconds counts as a kill, not sure how they treat snapshots though.
For IR missile shots, I believe instructors can call for the fight to continue after a simulated missile kill, to simulate a missile missing the target.
No idea how they do BVR's though.
I mean, if DCS can simulate missiles, why can't some sort of computer (maybe on the AWACS or something) track the aircraft and simulate the missiles? It wouldn't have to render anything so it'd be dedicated entirely to calculating the missiles, and they'd have much more accurate and realistic data for their simulation as well. If a consumer-grade video game can accurately and realistically simulate missiles in real time, I imagine a military-grade dedicated missile simulation computer can do it in pretty much exactly the same way.
From what i remember in my fathers last flight at Nellis (we got to hang out in the command center and watch live 3d acmi before shooting him with water bottles on the flightline) bvr was done by simulating the missles.. i mean i saw fake missles leaving the 3d animated wireframe aircraft and saw as they tracked and "hit". You could hear them calling out the hits on the radio and would have to leave the fight. Our "guide" would kinda explain what was goin on and point at where my dad was. This was in the mid ninties.. so i would expect it to be different now.
A lot of it is after the fact in debrief. Its mostly tactics taught, I watched a Real ACMI recording and was impressed by the amount of "Jousting" In real life. they don't want to die so its a bunch of probing run-ins BVR. I'm sure there's a technical term for this...Dog fights seemed to be an emergency only thing or when they clearly had the upper hand.
In the end controlling the situation is what wins the fights and it appeared that is what they were teaching. its not 'GET THE KILL' its control...make them make a mistake, get the kill, control again...
Thanks for all the replies guys!
Typically ACMI (Air Combat Maneuvering Instrumentation) systems are used to keep track of all flights and are capable of calculating hit probability. Planes are equipped with ACMI pods that work with ground based systems and I believe instructors will indicate as to the success or failure of missile launches.