EA-18G pilot tells why Naval Aviators have to trade some of their flight time for carrier landing training

A miniature airfield

It takes skills and nerves of ice for a US Navy pilot to land an aircraft on a carrier’s flight deck, essentially a miniature airfield, that is pitching, rolling and yawing in rough seas which these ships operate in.

Landing on an aircraft carrier is one of the most difficult tasks a pilot has to execute. The flight deck is only 150 meters long, just enough to stop the aircraft.

To facilitate the “safe and expeditious recovery” of naval aircraft aboard aircraft carriers specially trained naval aviators, designated landing signal officers (LSOs), assist pilots by means of the “ball” and by giving information via radio handsets.

Unlike pilots in other military services or pilots of commercial aircraft, aircraft carrier pilots don’t have the luxury of landing on 6,000-10,000 feet because we are trying to land on a postage stamp in the middle of blackness.

Stopping in dozens of feet

Adam Daymude, former US Navy EA-18G Grolwer pilot, explains on Quora;

‘The [F-16] Viper and [F-15] Eagle both have a tailhook as well, but it’s a spindly little thing. It’s only deployed in the direst of emergencies and the gouge I got is that it basically wrecks the airframe. And that’s to engage a field wire that spools out over a few hundred feet! We stop in dozens of feet!

‘Air Force jets are amazing at what they do. They wouldn’t cut it at the boat though. USN planes not only have to perform missions similar to USAF planes, they also have to come back and land on a postage stamp in the middle of the ocean. At night…in the goo.

Carrier landing training

‘During Vietnam, a study was done on the heart rate/stress levels for Navy pilots. They found that even above combat missions when people are shooting at you, stress levels during a night landing dwarf anything else. I can’t stress this enough:

‘Landing at the boat at night is damn near impossible, yet we do it on a nightly basis. To accomplish this task, we Navy pilots have to sacrifice some of our flight time, and a whole lot of our home time, to practice at the field. It was awesome (not) getting night landings in when I was stationed in WA where the sun doesn’t set in the summer until 10 PM. You’d be lucky if your squadron booked the first window, but it wasn’t unusual to start the jet up at 2 AM and then bounce until 4.’

Daymude concludes;

‘Air Force guys and gals never have to deal with this.’

Photo credit: U.S. Navy