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Hybrid Aircraft

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Ospreys line up on the camp’s runway (left), where several will undergo routine maintenance. The MV-22 has a mission-readiness rate of 80 percent.

Osprey at War

Can the MV-22 pass muster in Afghanistan?
May 2010 | By Ed Darack

<b><i>Writer and photographer Ed Darack</b></i> spent time in December 2009 with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 261 (VMM-261) in southern Afghanistan. In addition to Darack’s story, “Osprey at War,” featured in our April / May issue, we offer a slideshow of images taking during his stay. <br><br>“The pilots put the tip lights on for safety during nighttime and at dawn and dusk,” says Darack. “They just started this one up—you can see the plume of white smoke.” <br><br>Many of the Osprey pilots used to fly the Boeing CH-46 Sea Knight, known colloquially to the Marines as the “Phrog.” “Basically, coming from the CH-46, I felt safe in the Phrog because it had two .50-caliber machine guns,” says Captain Chris Meixell of VMM-261, “but with this airframe, we have triple-redundant flight controls, and those controls are routed in different parts of the airframe. The engines are 46 feet apart, which decreases the chances of both of them getting shot out by enemy fire, and [the MV-22] can climb to 9,000 feet in airplane mode on one engine. The fuel system is a suction type system, and if you take a round, it is just going to suck air, it is not going to spray fuel. The greatest safety advantage is the performance of the aircraft itself, which allows us to climb quickly out of small-arms and shoulder-launched surface-to-air missile range.”

A Tiltrotor Squadron in Afghanistan

Scenes of a Marine unit flying the incredible, versatile Osprey.
March 15, 2010 | By Rebecca Maksel

The BA609.

Tiltrotors for the Rest of Us

An Osprey for commuters? Bring it on. Can we get a quiet car too?
September 2009 | By Mark Wolverton

The FAA classifies the Osprey as a "powered lift" aircraft-neither airplane nor rotorcraft.

Tilters

You might say that Osprey pilots are neither fish nor fowl.
September 2007 | By John Croft

Would Patent #1,665,114 fly? Only in Tesla

Nikola Tesla's Curious Contrivance

"You should not be at all surprised if someday you see me fly from New York to Colorado Springs in a contrivance which will resemble a gas stove and weigh almost as much."— Nikola Tesla, 1913
September 2006 | By A.J.S. RAYL

Origin of the Species

We want speed! We want vertical lift! The Bell XV-3 Tilt-rotor was the first to satisfy all aeronautical tastes.
July 2004 | By Jay Miller

On a cool day, with a bit of wind and a light load, the Kellett jump giro could leap straight up some 15 feet, gain forward speed, and climb out. But in hot weather and still air, with a full load of fuel and a passenger, it merely lurched upward, relying on its straining engine and propeller to pull it out.

Above & Beyond: Jump Ship

March 2001 | By E. Stuart Gregg

Extreme Machine

The U.S. Marine Corps' sword gets a brand-new edge.
November 1998 | By George C. Larson


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