23 July, 2023 Operation Hormuz 6

[Rhino]

VFA-41 Black Aces were tasked with an anti-shipping mission in the Strait of Hormuz. Intelligence and ISR assets indicated the Iranian Navy was using unusually bad weather in the region to sortie a large portion of it's naval fleet from their homeport of Bandar Abbas. Weather was generally terrible at the surface with a ~3,000 foot cloud ceiling and rain. Six Black Aces sortied for the mission in two flights. Dealer 2, consisting of two aircraft launched first, rendezvoused in the air and proceeded to waypoint 2 to hold. Dealer 1, consisting of four aircraft, launched with out delay and also rendezvoused overhead at Waypoint 1 after breaking out of the cloud layer above 12,000 feet. Dealer 2 was tasked to push ahead of Dealer 1 and launch TALD decoys to entice the Iranian naval vessels to activate their radars and reveal themselves. After launching TALDs, Dealer 2 orbited in the area to provided CAP coverage for any Iranian air presence, but none was detected ingressing the area of operations. The TALD's were shown to be ineffective at getting the Iranians to activate their air search or fire control radars.

Realtime intel updates from unmanned ISR aircraft were passed to the Dealer flights via Strike indicating the enemy flotilla of approximately seven vessels had split into two groups and were sailing in opposite directions within the Strait of Hormuz. Dealer 1 aircraft were able to locate two distinct groups of surface contacts at a range of nearly 80 nm using SEA radar. Dealer 1-1 and 1-2 were ordered to engage the eastern group while Dealer 1-3 and 1-4 were assigned the western group. Each aircraft was armed with four AGM-84D Harpoon missiles and each launched two on the first attack run. Despite attempting to target both enemy naval groups, the first volley of Harpoons all tracked the eastern group of ships, made up of four vessels. Two were struck and destroyed by the first volley.

After turning cold and awaiting results, BDA information was passed from the ISR aircraft via Strike of some successful hits, but directed a re-attack. On the second attack run, the remainder of Dealer Harpoons were expended, with the western group (three ships) also being engaged as well as the eastern group. One ship in the western group was hit and destroyed as well as the two remaining vessels of the eastern group. With Dealer aircraft Winchester on anti-ship ordinance, all aircraft departed the area and conducted a Case III recovery in cloud and rain.

After action telemetry shows several Harpoons were targeted on the same individual ship, resulting in later fired missiles losing their target and detonating harmlessly in the water. A future training point would be to explore how close launching aircraft need to get in order to further breakout tightly grouped ships via the SEA radar for individual vessel targeting in order to ensure saturation targeting of multiple vessels. Overall however, five of seven enemy warships were destroyed and are now resting on the bottom of the Stait. Mission is deemed a success.

DEALER 1:
1-1 Rhino - enemy ships hit, trapped
1-2 Chaos - enemy ships hit, ramp strike on recovery
1-3 Mr. Bean - trapped
1-4 Crash - trapped

DEALER 2:
2-1 Trim -trapped
2-2 Maniac - trapped.

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[Hedgehog]

Pilot records and Greenie Board updated.