Chaff?????

Lance F

Lance F

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Lance F
On a flight Tuesday from Marco Island, FL to Athens, GA somewhere just south of the Florida border at FL280, we were advised by two consecutive controllers about "chaff" at our 11 o'clock position.
Frankly we had no idea what they were talking about and didn't question it. Did we misunderstand the transmission? If not, what the heck were they warning us about? Conditions were VMC, and we sure didn't see anything threatening.:confused::confused::confused:
 
Maybe this???

Chaff, originally called Window by the British, and Düppel by the World War II era German Luftwaffe, is a radar countermeasure in which aircraft or other targets spread a cloud of small, thin pieces of aluminium, metallised glass fibre or plastic, which either appears as a cluster of secondary targets on radar screens or swamps the screen with multiple returns.
Modern armed forces use chaff (in naval applications, for instance, using short-range SRBOC rockets) to distract radar-guided missiles from their targets. Most military aircraft and warships have chaff dispensing systems for self-defense. An intercontinental ballistic missile may release in its midcourse phase several independent warheads, a large number of decoys, and chaff.
Chaff can also be used to signal distress by an aircraft when communications are not functional. This has the same effect as an SOS, and can be picked up on radar. It is done by dropping chaff every 2 minutes.
 
IF ATC is advising of chaff then maybe they are letting you know that the radar coverage is degraded in a particular area. I'd be concerned if it was below Class A but find it harder to believe it would be a factor in the flight levels.

Of course it does tell you that there is some sort of military activity nearby...
 
Were you in/near an MOA or military air route? Doesn't seem like most military planes would just be spreading chaff around the countryside...
 
I know what the military definition of chaff is, but I've never heard of it in civilian airspace. This was the afternoon Air Force one flew from Florida back to Washington, but other than that we weren't in any hot military areas.
Should we have advised our passengers or activated our countermeasures:p:p?
 
Lance F said:
I know what the military definition of chaff is, but I've never heard of it in civilian airspace.
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Civilian airspace?

This was the afternoon Air Force one flew from Florida back to Washington, but other than that we weren't in any hot military areas.
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The Live Oak and Moody MOAs are just west of your route, it's common to have ATCAAs with similar boundaries above MOAs.
 
Well you learn something new everyday. If it ain't birds, it's chaff. Be careful up there.
 
Glad I read the thread. I thought it was about what happens after a 20 mile bicycle ride during the heat of summer.
 
If two different controllers felt the need to tell me about something and I didn't know what that something was I think I would have asked.
 
kevin47881 said:
Glad I read the thread. I thought it was about what happens after a 20 mile bicycle ride during the heat of summer.
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FWIW, the Brits pronounce "chafe" (which we pronounce with a long "a") the way we pronounce "chaff." And what we call "chaff," they call "window."

Six years in England makes one bilingual -- I can speak the Queen's English as well as American English. "Two nations separated by a common language," and all that.
 
Ron Levy said:
FWIW, the Brits pronounce "chafe" (which we pronounce with a long "a") the way we pronounce "chaff." And what we call "chaff," they call "window."

Six years in England makes one bilingual -- I can speak the Queen's English as well as American English. "Two nations separated by a common language," and all that.
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Thanks, Ron!
 
Maybe the airplane forgot to safe it and jettisioned a bucket load and smartly advised ATC of the "test firing"....
 
Lance F said:
I know what the military definition of chaff is, but I've never heard of it in civilian airspace. This was the afternoon Air Force one flew from Florida back to Washington, but other than that we weren't in any hot military areas.
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Could AF1 be releasing chaff as a routine countermeasure? I'm sure it carries the dispensers.

Maybe just when it's passing over red states....:smile:

Ron Wanttaja
 
wanttaja said:
Could AF1 be releasing chaff as a routine countermeasure?
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I doubt it. The only preemptive use of chaff I've heard of is back in the WWII days when they'd create these giant chaff corridors, using bombers loaded chock-full of chaff to just pour it out, with the bomb-carriers following them in. Modern systems dispense chaff only in response to detected threats.
 
The airplane forgot?:rolleyes: Ain't no way that flies in front of the squadron commander.

Ron, its funny that I typed it that way...OK more likely the copilot forgot to safe the chaff....or the crewcheif got alittle too cocky and the pilots put them to work filling chaff buckets....
 
We used to drop chaff in the flight levels from the B-52. ATC would clear it and I don't think we were always in a MOA or restricted areas but I could be mistaken. It poses no threat to other aircraft once it has had time to dissipate. (Unless a bundle fails to open then it falls like a pack of cigarettes). Did you hear the controllers talking to any military aircraft around that time? (Doom, Jambo, Tuff, Scalp,Chill etc.). It might indicate what type of aircraft dropped it.
 
Ron Levy said:
I doubt it. The only preemptive use of chaff I've heard of is back in the WWII days when they'd create these giant chaff corridors, using bombers loaded chock-full of chaff to just pour it out, with the bomb-carriers following them in. Modern systems dispense chaff only in response to detected threats.
Click to expand...

If you are interested, in this fascinating talk the speaker describes the origins of chaff, and how its use resulted in a major aluminum shortage in the US during WWII: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFSPHfZQpIQ

Chris
 
maddog52 said:
Did you hear the controllers talking to any military aircraft around that time? (Doom, Jambo, Tuff, Scalp,Chill etc.). It might indicate what type of aircraft dropped it.
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No, but you get handed off from one controller to the next pretty fast in that area, so they could have been talking to them earlier. Glad that stuff can't hurt anything.
 
Ron Levy said:
I doubt it. The only preemptive use of chaff I've heard of is back in the WWII days when they'd create these giant chaff corridors, using bombers loaded chock-full of chaff to just pour it out, with the bomb-carriers following them in. Modern systems dispense chaff only in response to detected threats.
Click to expand...

Not necessarily. Chaff corridors are still a valid tactic and the capability still exists and has been used post WWII. Chaff comes in two flavors, track break chaff (TBC) and corridor chaff, oftentimes rope chaff. TBC is usually cut to shorter lengths since it is designed to reradiate the shorter wavelength/higher frequency radar signals used by terminal threat systems. Corridor or area chaff is longer to reradiate the lower frequency/longer wavelength of long range early warning and acquisition radars. Willy nilly dispensing of the long chaff can cause power outages by shorting out electrical transformers so it's use in training is strictly controlled.
 
We used to find chaff while deer hunting in the U.P. of Michigan in the "Big Bear" MOA.
It looked like silver mylar to me. B-52's T-33"s and F-106's flew out of K.I. Sawyer AFB Gwinn Mi at the time. Some said it was the 52's that dropped it in training as the 106's chased them.
We used to find it all over ,birds even wove it into their nests.
 
el con said:
We used to find chaff while deer hunting in the U.P. of Michigan in the "Big Bear" MOA.
It looked like silver mylar to me. B-52's T-33"s and F-106's flew out of K.I. Sawyer AFB Gwinn Mi at the time. Some said it was the 52's that dropped it in training as the 106's chased them.
We used to find it all over ,birds even wove it into their nests.
Click to expand...
Last time we were flying up, I was told that Big Bear was pretty much closed these days. Is that the case?
 
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