P-8i: India’s Navy Picks Its Future High-End Maritime Patrol Aircraft
Latest Updates:
3rd plane delivered; Pentagon testers says that the P-8A has big problems. It could still be very useful to India – though there is ONE problem that really has to be fixed.
Jan 23/14: Testing. Bloomberg News reports that an unreleased copy of the Pentagon’s annual DOT&E report isn’t positive for the P-8A. DOT&E chief Michael Gilmore reports that the P-8 still exhibits “all of the major deficiencies” identified in last year’s report, and is “not effective [DID: does not meet stated criteria] for the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance mission and is not effective for wide area anti-submarine search”.
To review, DOT&E’s FY 2012 annual report (q.v. Jan 17/13) focused on the P-8 sensors’ ability to work as advertised, and to work together. The main radar has track-while-scan deficiencies, problems with high-resolution image quality, radar pointing errors that were especially troublesome over land and in littoral regions, and cross-cue errors with the MX-20HD surveillance turret. The MX-20HD itself had issues with auto-track integration, and interference was making it hard for the AN/ALQ-240(V)1 ESM systems to accurately pinpoint radars and communications sources around the plane.
Reactions in India were as negative as one might image, but that doesn’t mean the P-8is are useless to India. The P-8i’s speed, sensors, and civil airspace compatibility could still allow them to act as important adjuncts, and may even make them more useful than existing Tu-142/IL-38 aircraft, even if they don’t match the advanced American standards set for them. USN Lt. Caroline Hutcheson says the P-8s “fully met” the criteria for “effective” patrols, which is not the same as DOT&E’s definition of “effective” as “meeting all contracted capabilities”.
Unfortunately, Bloomberg’s report didn’t discuss the P-8′s deficiencies in detail, and the FY 2012 report cited a main P-8 fuel tank that overheats in hot weather during grounding and low-level flight. That’s not a great feature in India, and would be a real problem for the P-8i if it hasn’t been fixed. Sources: Bloomberg, “Boeing Surveillance Plane Found Not Effective for Mission”. Sources: Bloomberg, “Boeing Surveillance Plane Found Not Effective for Mission” | India’s Business Standard, “Pentagon report: Indian Navy’s new submarine hunter is ineffective”.
P-8i: India’s Navy Picks Its Future High-End Maritime Patrol Aircraft