Attack Helicopters combat survivability

Kinda puzzling as I'd imagine that in the anti-tank role; MBTs, AT missile-vehicles, close air support aircraft, multirole fighters, etc... would be rather more survivable than attack helos, albeit less flexible and seeing a lot fewer targets.

Attack Helicopters are the ultimate multipurpose warmachine on the battlefield, they can destroy vast majority of targets on the ground from soft targets to tanks and even in future high effectivley even SHORADS with extended ranged weapons such as Hermes-A or via airborne droppable drones which were rumored to be equipped with 1-2kg warhead and performe dive attacks.

Much cheaper and more effective than actual air strikes by jets, can loiter on the battlefield and more effecient showing precense, close air support, CSAR missions or "stealth" operations performed via NoE flights.

The future belongs to Attack helicopters.

Apaches were restricted during the attack on Serbia because of the fear of low level Manpads. In Iraq, a flight of Apaches was seriously damaged by ground fire and that was pretty much that for the use of attack helicopters in a major role. Israel has had similar experience. Not to mention the propaganda value in Afghanistan of Stingers blowing Soviet helicopters out of the sky. In Viet Nam, the US lost 5000 helicopters. Helicopters are invariably slow and much easier to target than jets. The fast movers do the hard work and the helicopters only can come in when the enemy doesn't have significant air defense capabilities.

Werewolf wrote:Attack Helicopters are the ultimate multipurpose warmachine on the battlefield, they can destroy vast majority of targets on the ground from soft targets to tanks and even in future high effectivley even SHORADS with extended ranged weapons such as Hermes-A or via airborne droppable drones which were rumored to be equipped with 1-2kg warhead and performe dive attacks.

Much cheaper and more effective than actual air strikes by jets, can loiter on the battlefield and more effecient showing precense, close air support, CSAR missions or "stealth" operations performed via NoE flights.

The future belongs to Attack helicopters.

not this again, even mig-21 can down attack helos at will. in coinops the enemy would just hide and pop out with a manpad or hmgs or aks or not show up at all. they cant loiter for too long at all unlike ground forces that can stay indefinitely as long as supplies are delivered. Plus, they are expensive to maintain and moreso when they drop to the sky.

The use of helicopters requires common sense and proper planning, but new sensors and systems and defensive suites should allow them to operate on a modern battlefield and be effective.

They wont be invincible, but they will be very effective... their main bane is MANPADS and DIRCMS should aleviate that issue, and the Russian helos are rather better equipped against small arms fire than any other helo made today.

Soviet experience in Afghanistan is not really relevant as their helos were not fully night capable and were vulnerable to IR guided missiles.

I guess Russia sees choppers as the main anti-tank weapon of the air.

AFAIK the Mi-28Ns will be upgraded to Mi-28NM level too.

With net centricity an attack helicopter is both an attack asset and a data collection asset... very useful in both roles.

calripson wrote:Apaches were restricted during the attack on Serbia because of the fear of low level Manpads. In Iraq, a flight of Apaches was seriously damaged by ground fire and that was pretty much that for the use of attack helicopters in a major role. Israel has had similar experience. Not to mention the propaganda value in Afghanistan of Stingers blowing Soviet helicopters out of the sky. In Viet Nam, the US lost 5000 helicopters. Helicopters are invariably slow and much easier to target than jets. The fast movers do the hard work and the helicopters only can come in when the enemy doesn't have significant air defense capabilities.

By the same ticket, any large modern IADS and the fast movers will be eating dirt in a scrap pile themselves.

The USSR did use the Mi-24 as its primary anti-tank airframe, and deployed them in massive numbers in the West.

attack helos are good, however if ther are systems like Tor and Pantsir around they will have a very hard time surviving, let alone completing missions. Not only that, even IFVs and MBTs(though at least mostly rus systems) are joining in the fun that is helo-swatting. So in short, attack helos take backseat in conventional war though in coin they are the star(neat sensors and mandpad small arms resistant).

collegeboy16 wrote:attack helos are good, however if ther are systems like Tor and Pantsir around they will have a very hard time surviving, let alone completing missions. Not only that, even IFVs and MBTs(though at least mostly rus systems) are joining in the fun that is helo-swatting. So in short, attack helos take backseat in conventional war though in coin they are the star(neat sensors and mandpad small arms resistant).

Tors and Pantsirs will not be in the same line as tanks, but some kilometers behind, so helicopters could act from safe range with very long range ATGMs like Hermes. BMPTs will be in the first line too and with that more free to fight with attack helicopters, but they also need longer range missile like Kornet-EM instead of Ataka or MANPAD.

Apaches weren't restricted in Serbia, 7 were lost and some of them crashed on Serbian soil, equipment and parts of Apaches are today in Museum.



F-117 part of airframe and gsuite of F-16 pilot



Apache shot down over serbia and crashed in albania.

US denied every loss that wasn't downed and crashed on Serbian soil, which afterwards everyone knew.
The entire air strike campaign was a disaster for NATO, dozens of aircrafts lost and NATO claimed to have destroyed over 30 jets of serbians on ground, which majority were just dummies just like this MiG-29 dummy and tank dummies.

medo wrote:
Tors and Pantsirs will not be in the same line as tanks, but some kilometers behind, so helicopters could act from safe range with very long range ATGMs like Hermes. BMPTs will be in the first line too and with that more free to fight with attack helicopters, but they also need longer range missile like Kornet-EM instead of Ataka or MANPAD.

Well when they have the same protection as tanks they can be much closer to the action. Besides that they can always shoot hermes missiles, not like a mi-28/ka-52 can carry more than 16 of these heavy mofos. Also with future nakidka stuff tanks cant be seen from 20km away, most prolly helos will find themselves in tanks thermals esp. Since tank thermals are now Qwip.
hmm,

Aproximately how many J are needed to down non armored fixed wing aircraft upon detonation a few meters away. The stinger has a tiny compared to other SAMs J output. Can a Mi-28 or Mi-8 ,etc. Survive a MANPAD hit if it detonates on a non lethal spot. Also if the Gepard peppers a The same Russian helicopters will they disintegrate after the first hit or can their fuselage stay intact as long as no critical areas are hit? What about the Vulcan?

KomissarBojanchev wrote:Aproximately how many J are needed to down non armored fixed wing aircraft upon detonation a few meters away. The stinger has a tiny compared to other SAMs J output.

I don't think that you will have a treshold for a specific Joule force on a fixed wing aircraft that would kill it. For example a Stinger may hit one turbine of a fixed wing aircraft and is still capable to fly with the one remaining undamaged, the same stinger hits one wing, the wing breaks apart and in both cases same J force on the aircraft and one of these cases it is destroyed and the other not. It differes from situation to situation and where the SAM/MANPAD hits, but what i can ensure you with no crystal ball use, a SHORAD or even SAM would have a immidiate kill on fixed wing aircraft of fighter size.

Can a Mi-28 or Mi-8 ,etc. Survive a MANPAD hit if it detonates on a non lethal spot. wrote:

Yes, they can especially when it hits a non vital spot like the centric fuselage.
But there are also cases from Afghanistan war where Mi-24 were hit by all kinds of weapons from 7.62x39mm to WW1/2 37mm FLAK rounds, this is why some state that the Mi-24 cockpit armor can withstand 37mm.
There were several cases where Mi-24 was hit either by Strela or/and Stinger on vital parts as the turbines. A stinger struck the left engine and the explosion was mighty enough to rip out almost the entire engine and was a burning spot, but the helicopter and crew managed to fly back to the base.

Through the US involvement for the taliban they gave them all kinds of weapons from M2 Browning,Stingers and even MK-19 automatic grenadelaunchers were given to them.
6 times Hinds were shot with MK-19 (salvos of 40mm HE-Frag grenades) and 2 times they managed survive such ambushes in NoE flights.
The pilots who survived reported that about a dozen of 40mm HE-Frag grenades have hit them and ripped the entire left board of the compartment room away, you didn't even needed to use the door to get inside, along with the stubbed wing, but the helicopter managed to fly back barely to base. The helicopter had to be put out of service after that.

Reports of Mi-24 in afghanistan in russian language and all Accidents,incidents, damage,fatal lose and statistics of protection or hit probability of systemes you can find here.

http://artofwar.ru/z/zhirohow_m_a/text_0370-2.shtml

Also if the Gepard peppers a The same Russian helicopters will they disintegrate after the first hit or can their fuselage stay intact as long as no critical areas are hit? What about the Vulcan? wrote:

Single hits on none vital parts helicopters can and especially heavy armored like russian helicopters have shown to have still good chance to withstand or to maintain themselfs functioning after several impacts.

When it comes to Gepard which is outdated today due several reasons and outdated FCS and hitprobability are one of those reasons. Such a direct hit from 35mm is unlikely to have low effect, it is devestating regardless where it hits. A single hit or 2-3 hits may not be a instant kill for an heavy armored helicopter but it is a wall of bullets and that is hardly someone wants to face.

The vulcan may be have not the most effect rounds when it comes to Anti-aircraft role but the high amount of this rounds makes the difference and from the high rate of fire and the grouping of bullets makes it unlikely for aircrafts till 1.5km away to get away only with few hits.

For all situations and all current Anti-aircraft projectile weapons, they can be survived that is what helicopter are designed for to have a certain survivability, but that does not garantee anything.

Aproximately how many J are needed to down non armored fixed wing aircraft upon detonation a few meters away.

A bit like asking what calibre rifle is needed to kill a human... a 50 cal HMG wont kill you if it hits your finger tip... unless you happen to be picking your nose at the time... while a .22lr will kill if it penetrates your brain.

Can a Mi-28 or Mi-8 ,etc. Survive a MANPAD hit if it detonates on a non lethal spot. wrote:

Without knowing anything about anything object x will survive threat y if object x is hit in a non lethal place... that is the definition of non lethal...

Here a pic.. of a Mi-17 of the Syrian Army, hit in Syria by a man pad of rebels recently ,




Caused serious damage to the engine,but it managed to return to the base.according to them.
2 hits will have been fatal for sure. how much a difference a mi-28 could have done if was hit ..no idea..
But it is possible to survive a hit..

Vann7 wrote:Here a pic.. of a Mi-17 of the Syrian Army, hit in Syria by a man pad of rebels recently ,




Caused serious damage to the engine,but it managed to return to the base.according to them.
2 hits will have been fatal for sure. how much a difference a mi-28 could have done if was hit ..no idea..
But it is possible to survive a hit..  

Mi-17's are unarmored only some Mi-8 versions mostly Tsh or MTsh have bullet proof bottoms 12.7mm.
But alone from the image even an unexperiened eye can tell this is not an armored helicopter and in comperision of the methods and studies that were made to enchance the survivability of helicopters where one of the main solutions were to widley seperate engine blocks from each other that one missile couldn't destroy or damage both engines. And in consideration that this is an unarmored helicopter without engineblock seperation it has still a rather amazing survivability.

But i'm personally also amazed that this windows which i had digged up some source that stated this were just common acryl sheets which are not reinforced neither very thick or resistent.

A Mi-28 would have taken todays any common MANPAD rather with ease when compared to this unarmored Mi-17.

Werewolf wrote:

Vann7 wrote:Here a pic.. of a Mi-17 of the Syrian Army, hit in Syria by a man pad of rebels recently ,




Caused serious damage to the engine,but it managed to return to the base.according to them.
2 hits will have been fatal for sure. how much a difference a mi-28 could have done if was hit ..no idea..
But it is possible to survive a hit..  

Mi-17's are unarmored only some Mi-8 versions mostly Tsh or MTsh have bullet proof bottoms 12.7mm.
But alone from the image even an unexperiened eye can tell this is not an armored helicopter and in comperision of the methods and studies that were made to enchance the survivability of helicopters where one of the main solutions were to widley seperate engine blocks from each other that one missile couldn't destroy or damage both engines. And in consideration that this is an unarmored helicopter without engineblock seperation it has still a rather amazing survivability.

But i'm personally also amazed that this windows which i had digged up some source that stated this were just common acryl sheets which are not reinforced neither very thick or resistent.

A Mi-28 would have taken todays any common MANPAD rather with ease when compared to this unarmored Mi-17.

Maybe was an old soviet Manpad..  with a small warhead..
wondering how much deadly is an igla warhead over an old soviet man pad..

That looks like a lot of damage for 1 manpad honestly...

TR1 wrote:That looks like a lot of damage for 1 manpad honestly...

Thaught the same, when you look at the damage near the cockpit at the left side of the picture and than look closely at the damage left from the engine outtakes it looks like a "scar" so i assume it was a continouse-ROD warhead not just a normal HE-Frag warhead. and i guess it impacted (proximity detonated) right on the same level as the oil cooling intakes above the exhaust outtakes of the engines, that would explain how one MANPAD can make such damage.

Might have been an Igla with the warhead and fuel detonating...

The helicopter shown damaged is a Hip... Mi-8/-17 and is not generally armoured at all.

Evidence in Afghanistan showed they tended to burn out completely and leave just a pile of ash on the ground.

I comparison the Mi-24/35 left a shell of armour after being burnt out.

the better protection however is not good enough to save it from MANPADS, it is more for stopping small arms fire.

The Mi-24/35 is intended to operate under enemy fire so the weight of armour is justified. The Hips are transports so any armour reduces their performance in their primary role so armour was minimised.

I rather suspect newer models for domestic use likely have at least aramide type armour linings and other protection... often external armour plates can be seen on the nose of the aircraft below the lower transparencies.

dunno if others have this idea, but how effective would a Javelin type attack pattern for manpads be? Helos cant pop smoke without it
being blown away, APS would have a hard time intercepting through the blades let alone preventing the ensuing explosion from damaging
said blades and you really cant armor that part of the helo. Also, it could use a cheap radar that would be programmed to lock on the
rapidly spinning metal blades aside from thermals that would aid in initial target acquisition.

Because the missile is probably worth more than many helos...

ATGMs have been used successfully against helos for some time now... especially hovering helos which are particularly vulnerable targets.

GarryB wrote:Because the missile is probably worth more than many helos...

ATGMs have been used successfully against helos for some time now... especially hovering helos which are particularly vulnerable targets.

Javelin ATGM costs more than an Mi-28? I don't think so.

But you're right about Helis being vulnerable to ATGMS - which begs the question as to why the Mi-28 should be fitted with such a high level of armour - what use is it against weapon systems designed to demolish M1s and T-90 tanks?

About how much percent of the AA fire the Mi-28 is likely to encounter in conventional combat can its armor defend against? (I have the feeling 20mm HE and 12,7mm shells comprise too small of a percentage, the main part being SAMs, 30+mm rounds and 20mm AP)

If you want to speak about Javelin in particualarly than it is not a bigger threat than any RPG, actually in most situation you will be much safer from Javelins than from someone who is skilled in ambushes with RPG's.

The Javelin has a very strict engagement pattern, meaning if a target is moving on ground it will be able to adjust itself fast enough not to lose the target from its IR sight spectrum, but when we are taking about an aircraft into account that is the "target" than it has almost no chance to hit its target when the helicopter is flying with any cruising speed. IR sight of Javelin has very poor contrasting for air-ground capability, it was never designed to be used against helicopters, meaning the helicopter has to fly very low so the IR sight has a much better filtering for the target. The engine of the missile is also not designed to make any high maneuvers in their to chase its victim. AA missiles would follow a flight path which calculates the area of interception with its target. In the case of Javelin against an helicopter it would need to chase its target, consuming much more fuel and in most situation completley lose its target out of its sight.

The situation where i can imagine that a helicopter flying (not hovering) could be hit by a javelin missile is a Low flying with relative low speed towards the Launcher or at least in a direction that could be considered towards the "luancher" with a vector-tilt that wouldn't surpass the Javelins engine adjustment to correct itself into the same direction.

The only real use of Javelins against helicopters are low altitude hovering targets within 1.7-2km since it has to follow still its strict engagement pattern = above its target and than dive on it.


Coming to your another point of Hardkill systemes on helicopters. Such systemes would have many negative aspects before they would gain any positive aspect.
For instance they would need to equip the helicopter with 360° AESA or at least MMW radar which only Mi-28N/NM has today, if another helicopter would wanted such a systeme he would have a much higher radiation spectrum which can be used with modern RFI systemes (Radar Freuency interference) which are more and more equiped on systemes and attack helicopters aswell, but this is still a rather small negative point.
Another point would be a very high costs and how such a system should be arranged on the fuselage to have a 360° azimuth and 60-90° elevation for interception of incoming threats.
The point of you made about nearby explosions coming from Hardkill would have an effect on the helicopter itself is a point but could be in theory countered with Hardkill systeme with a "shotgun" like grenades that spread towards the target to reduce the the risk for helo, but one problem would still remain, the remaining kinetic energy and mass of the anti-aircraft missile that was guided on the interceptance point of its target (heli). Mach 2-2.5 should have still enough energy to make significant amount of damage on the fuselage which also depends where it would impact.
But the biggest point is the relative low effeciency against targets of Mach 2+ = meaning almost none existent with todays technology and the very high amount of costs and relative high risks.

The best solution we have are DIRCM's, low risk, much lower costs and very high effeciency.

The only systeme i could imagine helpfull is such radar/ir immiting decoys which were designed for bigger fixed wing aircrafts which could outshadow the emmision of the helicopter.



Decoy beacons which are sometimes used by bigger aircrafts to spread an emmision in IR/RF spectrum, would be only situational on helicopters use.

About how much percent of the AA fire the Mi-28 is likely to encounter in conventional combat can its armor defend against? (I have the feeling 20mm HE and 12,7mm shells comprise too small of a percentage, the main part being SAMs, 30+mm rounds and 20mm AP) wrote:

What exactly do mean by how much percent of AA fire Mi-28 should be able to encounter?

You understand that it depends always on situations and where those HE-frag rounds will hit the aircraft.
From video footage of SPAAG's i have the perception that within 15-2km range the spread of fire is relative wide if you only would consider one Burst of a Thunguska as the maximum engagement against your helicopter, but i don't think he will stop after one burst, but finish you with several bursts.
At such ranges i assume 2-4 bursts would be suffecient enough to kill even the highest armored Attack helicopter and after 1-2 every western designed helicopter.

Take for instance this video footage of Tunguskas bursts and the how big the spread is on about 2km distance.

footage from 0:50 and 01:00


The survivability within 2km is almost zero for any helicopter, one will take a few frames longer to be destroyed other a few less.
Everything from 20mm HE-Frag and below will need a much closer range with 1km and an RPM of similiar to V2 Vulcan to be considered effective.

The biggest thread so far are still not single seperated or isolated forces with limited Anti-aircraft capability but a fortified battlefield with high intel and a compliment of different overlapping AA/SAM weapons.

But the highest percentage of AA weapons today are still 12.7mm followed by 20-23mm, MANPADS and much less 30-35mm AA weapons.