AC-130 "Spooky" Gunship/Aircraft

AC-130 "Spooky" Gunship/Aircraft

Abstract

The AC-130H Spectre gunship's primary missions are close air support, air interdiction and armed reconnaissance. Other missions include perimeter and point defense, escort, landing, drop and extraction zone support, forward air control, limited command and control, and combat search and rescue. These heavily armed aircraft incorporate side-firing weapons integrated with sophisticated sensor, navigation and fire control systems to provide surgical firepower or area saturation during extended periods, at night and in adverse weather. During Vietnam, gunships destroyed more than 10,000 trucks and were credited with many life-saving close air support missions. AC-130s suppressed enemy air defense systems and attacked ground forces during Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada. This enabled the successful assault of Point Salines airfield via airdrop and airland of friendly forces. This paper will focus/tie to the 2 specific research questions i.e. what upgrades has the AC-130 based aircraft experienced in its existence?

and how has the AC-130 proven itself in theatres of conflict, in support of military operations?

Introduction

Boasting a lethal number of mini-guns, cannons and howitzers, the AC-130 Gunship has earned a reputation as one of the deadliest combat weapons on the planet. The heavily armed AC-130U Spooky aircraft incorporates side-firing weapons integrated with sophisticated sensor, navigation and fire control systems to provide surgical firepower or area saturation during extended loiter periods, at night and in adverse weather. The sensor suite consists of a television sensor, infrared sensor and radar. These sensors allow the gunship to visually or electronically identify friendly ground forces and targets any place, any time. The AC-130U Spooky is the third generation of C-130 gunships(Michael 2011). The AC-130U employs aperture strike radar for long-range and adverse weather target detection and identification. The aircraft's navigational devices include the inertial navigation systems and global positioning system.

The AC-130U Spooky was originally armed with a 25mm GAU-12/U cannon (capable of firing 1,800 rounds per minute), a single-barrel, rapid-fire 40mm Bofors L/60 cannon, and a modified 105mm M102 howitzer. The AC-130U's GAU-12/U replaced replaced the 2 M61A1 20mm cannons used on the AC-130H, but otherwise retained the previous armament fit. A number of programs were subsequently initiated to investigate additional AC-130U armament options. The AC-130U employs the latest technologies and can attack two targets simultaneously. (Bennett 2012)

The AC-130U gunship is a complex aircraft weapon system (Andrade 2009), containing more than 609,000 lines of software code in its mission computers and avionics systems. Although still using the venerable Lockheed C-130 airframe, the AC-130U incorporates the advanced sensor technology, along with an entirely new fire-control system compared to previous AC-130 gunships, to substantially increase the gunship's combat effectiveness. The fire control system offers a dual-target attack capability, whereby 2 targets up to one kilometer apart could be simultaneously engaged by 2 different sensors, using 2 different guns. All light-level television, infrared sensors, and the Hughes AN/APQ-180 radar (also found on the F-15E Strike Eagle) provides night and adverse weather capability. The strike radar provided the first gunship capability for all weather/night target acquisition and ...