- Reaction score
- 33
- Points
- 560
Little historic tidbit. The US needed some means of locating the main force NVA and "Popular Force" VC at night, and one program was to create a very quiet aircraft to overfly potential infiltration routes and scan them with night vision equipment. The YO-3 was the result, evolving from a glider (the Wikipedia article lays out the development sequence).
Something like this might still have some use today as an spotter or FAC aircraft (where you might desire a man in the loop), but most of the tasks are now taken by UAVs and powerful sensors mounted on high performance or high altitude aircraft.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_YO-3
http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/stalker.html
http://www.aviastar.org/air/usa/lok_yo-3.php
Something like this might still have some use today as an spotter or FAC aircraft (where you might desire a man in the loop), but most of the tasks are now taken by UAVs and powerful sensors mounted on high performance or high altitude aircraft.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_YO-3
http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/stalker.html
http://www.aviastar.org/air/usa/lok_yo-3.php
