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AV-8A Harrier
The Harrier is a family of jet-powered attack aircraft capable of vertical/short takeoff and landing operations (V/STOL). Named after a bird of prey, it was originally developed by British manufacturer Hawker Siddeley in the 1960s. The Harrier emerged as the only truly successful V/STOL design of the many attempted during that era. It could operate from improvised bases with little improvement and later aircraft carriers. There are two generations and four main variants of the Harrier family, developed by both UK and US manufacturers:
- Hawker Siddeley Harrier
- British Aerospace Sea Harrier
- McDonnell Douglas AV-8B Harrier II
- British Aerospace Harrier II
The Hawker Siddeley Harrier is the first generation-version and is also known as the AV-8A Harrier; it was used by multiple air forces, including the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the United States Marine Corps (USMC).
The most difficult aircraft to fly
Pete Bowen, former US Marine Corps (USMC) AV-8B Harrier II pilot, explains why the AV-8A Harrier is the most difficult aircraft to fly on Quora;
‘The AV-8A (first generation) Harrier was probably the most challenging aircraft to fly. In the early days, only highly-selected pilots could fly Harriers and many of them died.
‘When decelerating into a hover, the Harrier pilots had to be very careful about a few things.
‘First, the engine only supports so much weight in the hover. If you come in too heavy or its too hot (which reduces thrust) or your altitude is too high (reduces thrust), you can crash.
‘Second, as you slow down coming into the hover, you have to keep your nose pointed into the wind. Optimally, you decelerate directly into the wind, but sometimes you have to come in with a crosswind. In that case, you can find yourself kicking in rudder to point the nose into the wind while flying sideways while lifting the opposite wing to stop over the pad while making sure that you have enough engine performance to actually land.
‘And you have to do all this and get the plane on the deck before your 90 seconds of water (for engine cooling and performance) runs out.
‘Third, in the AV-8A Harriers, they didn’t have much control surface authority when the airplane got slow. As you slow down, the aerodynamic surfaces lose effectiveness, so the aircraft uses a puffer duct system in the nose, wings and tail to move the airplane.
‘In the AV-8A, the puffer duct system wasn’t very powerful, so it was possible to get into an uncontrollable roll without the air duct performance to stop it. (That’s a bad thing).
Landing at night
‘Fourth, on hot days or at high elevations, it is possible to have the engine performance to hover, but not to actually land.
‘How does that happen? In the hover you are stable. To land, you need a bit of descent then, just before hitting the ground, you need enough power to stop that descent. It’s possible to be in the hover at max engine temperature with just enough performance to hover, but not the excess performance (about 25 degrees C) to touch down.
‘There are times when you are in the hover at max temp, shake the stick a bit to get some descent (the engine temp hits the limit which takes a bit of gas and thrust from the engine which causes a rate of descent) and then stop shaking the stick and hope the engine cools just enough on the way down that you have a bit of additional thrust to cushion the touchdown.
‘Finally, as hard as it is to land on a regular aircraft carrier at night, it was even harder to land a Harrier on an amphib at night.
AV-8A Harrier problem fixed in the AV-8B
‘For a regular carrier, you fly the lineup and airspeed and glide slope to touchdown and a cable stops you.
‘If you miss or bolter, you can go around and try again. If things are really crazy, you can go get some gas from a tanker and come back.
‘In a Harrier, you are coming to the back of the ship flying a similar ball, but you have to do the deceleration yourself. At 8/10 of a mile, you go to hoverstop (nozzles pointing down) to slow down.
‘If you come in too fast, you’ll fly by the landing lights and now you can’t see anything.
‘If you come in too slow, your engine will heat up and you will use all of your 90 seconds of water before you get to the landing spot. You will probably well end up ejecting in that case.
‘And remember, you are probably coming in with only enough gas to make one pass. There are no airborne tankers to go hit for more gas. Get the plane on-board or swim.’
Bowen concludes;
‘Note that some of these problems (i.e. control authority) were made better in the AV-8B Harrier. Other problems (landing at night) got much easier by adding night vision goggles and other equipment.’
Photo credit: U.S. Marine Corps
