Crash Caused by Brownout?

April 20, 2010

Audio of this article is brought to you by the Air & Space Forces Association, honoring and supporting our Airmen, Guardians, and their families. Find out more at afa.org

According to a report by Flight Global, USAF officials believe brownout conditions caused the April 8 crash of a CV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft that killed four, two Air Force Special Operations Command airmen, a US soldier, and a civilian. Flight Global attributes the information to “a source familiar with preliminary findings of the US military investigation.” DARPA and the services have been working for several years on varied solutions to the problem of brownout, the term used to describe a greatly reduced visibility condition often caused by rotary wing aircraft in desert-like terrain. (For more on brownout solutions, also see Special Operations Technology July 2009 report; Aviation Today April 2010 report)

Audio of this article is brought to you by the Air & Space Forces Association, honoring and supporting our Airmen, Guardians, and their families. Find out more at afa.org

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