The Times Record April 27, 2005
If BNAS survives, its aircraft will change
By Michael Reagan
BRUNSWICK - Anew hangar at Brunswick Naval Air Station could be the key that keeps the base off the Base Closure and Realignment list.
The U.S. Navy is replacing its P-3 Orion planes - the aircraft so familiar in Brunswick skies - with several squadrons of the Multi-Mission Aircraft. The Multi-Mission Aircraft is a technologically enhanced Boeing 737. That model of aircraft has been used since 1970, said John James, director of public affairs for BNAS.
In part because of the transition from P-3C Orions to Multi-Mission Aircraft, the Navy broke ground on the new $31.4 million "Hangar 6" in April 2003. The construction of Hangar 6 makes Brunswick Naval Air Station well-suited to accommodate the new aircraft, said James. Hangar 6 is the only hangar at any Navy air base that's big enough to house the Multi-Mission Aircraft.
"If Brunswick survives the BRAC process, we should see MMA aircraft here beginning in approximately 2011," James said.
The federal government is scheduled to approve a closure and realignment list by the end of November. On May 13, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is scheduled to give a closure list to a nine-person commission, which will make recommendations directly to President Bush.
James added that the Multi-Mission Aircraft's noise profile - an aviation term referring to noise made taking off, landing, using reverse thrust and taxiing on a runway - is quieter than the P-3.
The new aircraft will be more expensive than the one it replaces. A commercial 737-800 model similar to the Multi-Mission Aircraft costs between $61.5 million and $69.5 million, according to Boeing's Web site. Complex surveillance equipment that will be installed for the Navy would push that price higher.
The last time P-3 Orions were manufactured for the U.S. Navy was in the early 1990s. The Navy's Web site listed the price of a P-3 as $36 million.
The Navy flew its first P-3 in 1961. Originally, the plan called for each plane to have a service life of 10,000 hours. According to the Navy, today's P-3s are an average of 26 years old and some have flown for more than 20,000 hours. The Navy expects the entire fleet of P-3s to be replaced by the MMA by 2019.
The Multi-Mission Aircraft will have the ability to assume the role of P-3s, doing surveillance over water and land. Like the P-3, the Multi-Mission Aircraft also will be able to carry missiles, torpedoes, mines and bombs.
An aircraft known for its quality, like the Boeing 737, can act as a kind of "work horse" for the Navy, said Dover-Foxcroft resident John Battick, a retired professor of naval and maritime history at the University of Maine. Unlike high-performance jets, which are typically in the air for short periods of time, a surveillance aircraft needs to have endurance, Battick said.
There have been no estimates on how many MMAs might come to Brunswick, said James.
The Multi-Mission Aircraft will rely on jet engines instead of the P-3's propeller-driven turboprop engines and will be a little bigger than the P-3, said John Pike, director of Globalsecurity.org. The Alexandria, Va., business runs a Web site that provides defense and security-related information to the public and is not affiliated with any defense contractor.
The aircraft differ in carrying capacity as well. The Multi-Mission Aircraft will have a maximum takeoff weight of 185,000 pounds, while the P-3's limit is 140,000 pounds.
It is a long-range, anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft capable of broad-area, maritime and coastline operations, according to Boeing's Web site, www.boeing.com.
Air surveillance
The Navy has had maritime surveillance aircraft since the 1920s. Surveillance aircraft first looked for battleships and during World War II patrolled for Japanese aircraft carriers. Later, they searched for Soviet submarines.
Pike said that today surveillance aircraft could, for example, search for small boats in the Indian Ocean that may be connected to terrorist activity.
From 1963 to about 1968, Brunswick Naval Air Station transitioned from P-2 Neptune to the P-3, James said. He said that if BNAS stays open, there will be a similar transition period during which P-3s and MMAs will be at the station at the same time.
The Navy has about 200 P-3s worldwide and about 40 in Brunswick. Once the Navy makes the switch in aircraft, it will have a total of about 108 Multi-Mission Aircraft and about 40 Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. The UAVs, as James called them, are used for aerial surveillance and reconnaissance.
Although the total number of planes will drop when the switch from P-3s to Multi-Mission Aircraft occurs, the overall number of people scheduled to serve in the Navy will remain the same. The Air Force is scheduled to keep the same number of personnel while the Army is scheduled to increase its troops, Pike said. The Marines are supposed to have a small increase.
"I'm at a loss to see which bases would be closed because there's no reduction in force structure," he said. "If anything, it's getting bigger."
The planned closure of bases in the United States will occur just as European bases are slated for closure by the Department of Defense.
"They've pretty much pulled the plug in Germany. They've announced plans to close bases in the next several years," Pike said.
While some bases will close, others in the United States may have to expand to accommodate increases in the number of military personnel, Pike said.
© Copyright 2005, The Times Record
