Ground assets

In the past in posts such as Nimrod Reborn and Vulcan B4, I have inexpertly considered how the RAF might acquire some larger aircraft at a reasonable price. They way any price can be made more reasonable is by getting more for your money, in terms of functionality. If you have something as capable as the aircraft outlined then you want to make maximum use of them, preferably without shortening their useful life with added fatigue.

One of the things the impressed me about the Victor was that the flight engineer could start the engines before getting in the aircraft via a panel on the hatch. This made a lot of sense when the aircraft was on Quick Reaction Alert, every second counted. I did wonder why the hardstanding didn't have a cable to connect the aircraft to the Crew Ready Room and the start up done that bit earlier.

There may be some good reason for it but it could just have been to complicated for the era. Today commercial airliners are supplied with power while they are on the ground from onboard APU for short periods and Ground Power Units for longer. They is considerable pressure to move to Fixed Ground Power, where the aircraft is supplied from mains. This has the advantage of less kit on the apron as well as being potentially greener. So any modern aircraft military or otherwise I would expect to be capable of have an external connection.

The updates for aircraft systems are usually physically delivered to the aircraft vis USB fob or similar, this has some obvious security, similarly flight plans are loaded in the same way. On British Air Ways and perhaps other airlines Quick access recorder use physical means and beyond that wireless means to off load data, as this doesn't have security implications. Rolls Royce use satellites to relay data in near real time, while the engine is flying. This allows early diagnoses and pre-emptive repair. While the level of comms might not be appropriate for a military aircraft on active service, it would useful when not and with onboard data logging could still be provided after the flight.

If we have a power supply to the aircraft on the ground why not a high speed network connection. We can use that to uploaded and downloaded data and monitor the aircraft's systems to enhance availability. We might even go further. 

The modern aircraft is a mass of sensors and computers, being able to utilise them whilst on the ground be potentially useful. Passive IR watching at the sky, RWRs listening. Use of the aircraft's Tactical Data Links  to provide redundant communications. With the right aircraft it self-defence system chaff and flares could also be used.

In today's world of lock after launch it might even be possible to use some of the weapons on the aircraft, the Jaguars over wing pylons would have made that far easier but improved airfield defence is something worth having, not just against aerial targets, When push comes to shove an unflyable helicopter with Brimstone attached and under remote and secure control is a formidable machine.

A system similar to Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing could make use of any spare CPU power, which you can never have to much of. This on top of being able to start the engines remotely in an emergency and in the case of UAVs have them take off.

If only I could think of a way for a landing UAV to plug itself in to power and fuel the you could have a far sleeker ground operation.

At 1:56 there is a missile launch from an overwing pylon.