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Charlie Mike

Watch these Marines Fast-Rope out of this MV-22 Osprey

June 21, 2014

At a recent exercise, these infantry Marines fast-roped out of a hovering MV-22 Osprey.  They used to say it couldn’t be done – that the force of the downdraft made it too risky. Well these Marines are the latest to prove the naysayers wrong.

Check back with War on the Rocks in the coming days to see why these Marines are practicing this capability. Spoiler: it is very very cool.

 

Image Credit: War on the Rocks

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6 thoughts on “Watch these Marines Fast-Rope out of this MV-22 Osprey”

  2. 3 minutes to bail out of that beast is pretty good in my books.

    Okay I’m intrigued. Aren’t these the same Osprey’s that are prone to crashing under mysterious circumstances?

    Why is fast roping out of an Osprey better than fast roping out of a Blackhawk? Speed? Range? Different take-off locations?

  3. I’d also like to say this is the sort of thing I’d like to see more of on War on the Rocks . . . when there’s significance behind it of course.

    I’ll go the extra mile to read an article that ties specific tactical practices to a wider strategy.

    Part of why I loved the Amphibious Ops in the 21st Century piece

  4. Oh please… We’d better come up with something one hell of a lot faster than that. That bird would be HISTORY after the first 15 seconds over the drop zone… I flew CH-46 Recon Inserts and Extracts in Viet Nam. No effin’ way I’d hover until Charlie could get a bead on my bird and my crew and a team of Marines.

    CattleCall Numba 10

  5. I agree with Chuck. Even if you preclude the slow and shallow approach into the LZ, that MV-22 took at least 2 minutes to drop its Marines off. There is no way that you would ever have that much time in a hot zone. Worse, the MV-22 doesn’t even have side mounted machine guns for defense or suppressive fires! Yes, they’ve got a fancy belly gun that has been designed and tried, but when installed it takes up most of the cargo bay and has to be lowered from the belly mechanically before it can even be used.

    Did Vietnam not teach us anything? Over 90% of the helicopters shot down occurred in the landing phase as the NVA/VC learned that helicopters were most vulnerable on slow approach into the LZ while heavily loaded with troops/cargo. It also negated the US from using CAS as the helicopters were basically on top of the enemy who was shooting them down!

    By the way, what does a MV-22 cost these days? Last I heard, it was over $100 million a copy! What does an H-60 cost? 20 million? What about operating costs?

    Don’t even get me started on shipboard deck cycles. While nominally faster than a helicopter and able to fly slightly higher (still within the MANPAD/AAA enevelope ironically) these things don’t carry anymore people or cargo to the combat zone than a much cheaper (and defensively armed) helicopter does. I still can’t believe the Marine Corps staked its aviation medium lift future on these overly priced gimmicks.

  6. This displays one of the serious weaknesses of the MV-22. No matter how much the USMC wants to beat the drum of how amazing it is, it is in no way a replacement for the CH-46, having worked operationally with both. Cost for 1, maintenance issues, fragility, cargo load, and a million other problems make it the “queen” of the fleet. Most importantly it is worthless as a fast rope infil platform. Operators using it gave it the nickname “the elevator of death” because of the heavy rotor wash and the movement of the fast rope. A 60 can utilize 2 doors and make an infil of 12 troops in under 30 seconds if done correctly, and more importantly, they can do it from 10-30 feet. The point of a fast rope is not simply to get people out of a helicopter, but as the name suggests it is to be FAST, the lower the hover height, the faster the infil. The MV-22 might be capable of fast roping people, but it will never be preferred if you have ANY other assets, and it will never be adept at it.The MV-22 is a boondoggle, an overly complicated maintenance nightmare meant to replace an aircraft that was simple, rugged, and good at what it did. I laugh every time I see an ARG steaming with 12 MV-22s, first at the insane cost, and second knowing that probably more than 50% of those wont be flyable.