Within a few years JPALS will allow very accurate automatic landings in all conditions (up to a limit I guess), especially when fitted to Super Hornet and F-35C and aircraft of that era (UCLASS for example) so that the LSO will have not a lot to do except signal WAVE OFF as required. :-)
VIEW of the HUD near Touch Down is not so clear from the Screenshot - indicates a good approach however.
NAVAIR Flight Ready: Joint Precision Approach and Landing System 29 Jan 2014 NAVAIRSYSCOM
"Engineers at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., discuss the successful evolution of the Joint Precision Approach and Landing System (JPALS). Learn more about this innovative technology from inception to the first shipboard landing on USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71)."
"TRANSCRIPT: Capt. Darrell Lack/Program Manager, PMA-213, NAVAIR Air Traffic Management Systems Program Office; Shawn Faubion/Deputy Program Manager for Landing Systems, PMA-213; Paul Sousa/Assistant Manager for Test & Evaluation, JPALS; Dave Crawford/ Lead Test Engineer, JPALS
Faubion: JPALS is a precision approach and landing system based on GPS technology. Instead of the historically radar and beacon based landing systems which the navy and marine corps are currently using. It is intended to bring a capability and flexibility that those legacy landing systems don’t offer and also an interoperability that could be used across, eventually, ship, shore, manned, unmanned, fixed and rotary wing aircraft.
Lack: JPALS in the future is primarily going to be in the F-35 B and C models for the Navy and Marine Corps and also the UCLAS Unmanned air systems. It utilizes the existing GPS constellation it brings those signals in, does mathematical computations between two assets, and aircraft and then a ship, and it calculates a touch-down point onto an aircraft carrier deck.
Crawford: There was a lot of preparation to get ready for what was our very successful period on the boat. A lot of that started back in the September, October time frame here at Pax River. We did conduct a large number of F/A-18 flights here shore based and built our way down from elevated touch downs to ultimately touchdowns to the deck here and all of that was in preparation to say we were ready to go do work on the boat.
Faubion: Patuxent River with its lab facilities allows us to demonstrate that JPALS can be integrated onto the ship in a very controlled fashion and we can demonstrate that without the risk, uncertainty and cost of actually being on the ship at the time.
Sousa: The latest at-sea testing was conducted aboard Theodore Roosevelt, CVN-71. We had two F-18 jets out there instrumented for JPALS, with the JPALS airborne system installed as well as the ship board system installed on the ship.
Lack: We had over 50 precision approaches and landings, the performance that we saw it was landing precisely where we were asking it to land, where it had been programmed to land and the pilot reports that came back it was very gentle, it was a gentle landing. It acted just like, if you will, just like the legacy systems; over all it was a very good success.
Fabuion: We’ve proven out that the ship system can provide the ability to land an air vehicle hands-off. We are going to be making some improvements over the next year or two to the JPALS ship system and to the software that’s going to be running in the air system so that it will have that degree of safety without a pilot in the loop.
Crawford: We had something that was good for us in this and that we kept it simple, we tried to use things we had done in the past to decide that we could work towards it at the ship and I think that helped us.
Sousa: It was a very pleasant experience to see, not only the system work the way it did, but the whole team, the JPALS, the program office, the test team, engineering, everybody working together along with the contractor; I think it was a very good evolution at sea. >>>out<<<"
