ASW dirigible

[TimothyC]

Shipright, don't unpowered "gliding" munitions rely, to a certain extent anyways, on the forward airspeed of the launch aircraft to increase their range? How much glide can you get dropping from an airship at 60 knots vs. a P3 or F/A-18 at 300 knots?

I honestly doubt it, lateral momentum would bleed off quickly for any unpowered munition not augmenting it with glide momentum. Glide momentum is achieved by redirecting vertical momentum achieved from gravity to lateral momentum (or up drafts but that does not apply here) bu using the speed from decent to provide the forces to make an airfoil work.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/transp ... lider3.htm

It's both. You get better glide range out of anything if you launch it higher and faster - this held true for an SRAM out of an YF-12 (Lockheed's proposed bomber version would have gotten more than triple the range from the same missile off of a B-52), or SBDs out of F-22 (glide ranges again more than double, mostly from additional forward velocity). To make matters worse for the blimp, it's going to be at a lower altitude than the P-3s and Hornets can be at for launching the weapons.

[Shipright]

Makes sense.

A JSOW has a range of 12nm at low altitude drop and 70nm at high altitude. I have no idea what altitude qualifies for each and I am sure that was assuming being dropped form a conventional fighter with forward momentum. A surface launched ASROC only has a range of 14nm, so if you can meet or beat that you are providing some value in that respect.

I suppose effectiveness depends on what altitude an ASW blimp would operate at. I honestly have no idea.