The United States Air Force Has Found A Military Use For Tesla's Ludicrous Mode
Tesla has replaced Muscle Cars as The Air Force's chase vehicle of choice.
The U2 spy plane is a product of the Cold War. Developed during the 1950's the U2 flew countless missions over Russia, China and Cuba to give the United States valuable intel on hostile rivals. The U2 operating altitude was damn near 70,000 feet and was well suited for photographing large chunks of enemy territory. The problem was the U2 was extremely difficult to navigate on land. Its huge wings and large turning circle made simple acts like taking off and landing more difficult than in traditional planes.
The Air Force came up with a fairly simple solution, chase vehicles. The U2 may have been relatively slow when operating at high altitude but was actually quite quick on take off. This meant that any chase vehicles needed to be fast in a straight line. The natural choice were American muscle cars. The U2 landing gear is very narrow and this leads to horizontal instability while on the ground. These "mobile pilots" would radio hazards and sit-reps to the U2 pilot. All this significantly reduced accidents and is a tactic still in use today. Over its nearly 7 decades in service the U2 has received numerous tech upgrades and updates. Naturally the same was applied to the choice of chase cars. The new chase car of choice is Tesla's Model S P100D.
Why Teslas? Simple, few cars can match a ludicrous enabled Tesla in terms of acceleration. This means it has no problem keeping up with the jet powered spy plane on takeoff. In Ludicrous mode the P100D gets to 60 mph in less than 3 seconds.
Source: Popular Mechanics
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Comments (20)
What do you do for living?
-Oh i just race jets with my Tesla everyday
Not a bad job IMO
Anyone think a GTR Could do this just as well and keep up longer?
But the GTR isn't made in America, that's usually of some importance when the US forces make purchases.
at first i thought the same but the tesla is electric witch means smooth acceleration and the gtr might be brutal off the line but it has to change gears and its not like you need a lot of speed you only need too accelerate up to the take off speed of...
Read moreI don't understand why are chase cars needed. Maybe I'm thick right now but I don't think the article helps with its description.
Ok, I searched for it and now I get it. "The process is pretty simple: The Air Force buys fast and relatively inexpensive Detroit muscle and puts a highly trained pilot in the driver's seat. Those pilots then act as ground-based wingmen for...
Read moreIt basicly a bicycle with wide wings attached to it + the pilot only could look forwards so he couldn't see the ground what makes it so hard to land
Wow! I didn't know they still flew the U2. I thought the SR71 had replaced it. Learn something new every day. The title of the video though? These planes do not take off vertically.
The SR71 was removed (for the second and final time) from active service by the US Air Force in 1998 an NASA retired their last two aircraft the following year. The use of unmanned aircraft, satellite imagery, and technical deficiencies...
Read moreThe SR-71, while brilliant, was similar to the Concord. Too expensive to build, maintain and when you lose that speed advantage on missiles, just another diplomatic incident.