Fly Helicopter

The Kamov Ka-50 Black Shark is a single-seat Russian attack helicopter for destroying armored vehicles, slow-speed air targets and manpower on the battlefield. Distinctive coaxial Ka-50 helicopter has two three-blade rotors of 14.5-m diameter each. The airframe features perfect aerodynamic outlines, mid-set stub wing, retractable three-leg landing gear and empennage of a fixed-wing aircraft type. The pilot cockpit is fully armored. The emergency pilot escape system, comprising an ejection seat, saves the pilot within the entire flight speed and altitude range. A set of improved survivability means allows Ka-50 to attack successfully the specified targets and to survive under intensive fire counteraction. It was designed in the 1980s and adopted for service in the Russian army in 1995. It is currently manufactured by the Progress company of Arseniev. During the late-1990s, Kamov and Israeli Air Industries developed a tandem-seat cockpit version, the Kamov Ka-50-2 Erdogan (Turkish for "Born Warrior"), to compete in Turkey's attack helicopter competition.

The Ka-50 was designed to be small, fast, and agile to improve survivability and lethality. For minimal weight and size it was - uniquely among gunships - to be operated by a single pilot only. Kamov concluded after thorough research of helicopter combat in Afghanistan and other war zones that the typical attack mission phases of low-level approach, pop-up target acquisition, and weapon launch don't simultaneously demand navigation, maneuvering, and weapons operation of the pilot; and thus with well-designed support automation a single pilot can indeed carry out the entire mission alone. However, it is still an unanswered question whether in practice the rank and file of Black Shark pilots would nevertheless suffer from excess fatigue from this combined workload.

Like other Kamov's helicopters, it features Kamov's characteristic contra-rotating co-axial rotor system, which removes the need for the entire tail-rotor assembly and improves the aircraft's aerobatic qualities - it can perform loops, rolls, and “the funnel” (circle-strafing) where the aircraft maintains a line-of-sight to target while flying circles of varying altitude, elevation, and airspeed around it. Using two rotors means that a smaller rotor with slower moving rotor tips can be used compared to a single rotor design. Since the speed of the advancing rotor tip is a primary limitation to the maximum speed of a helicopter, this allows a faster maximum speed than helicopters such as the AH-64. The elimination of the tail rotor is a qualitative advantage because the torque-countering tail rotor can waste up to 30% of engine power. Furthermore, the vulnerable boom and rear gearbox are fairly common causes of helicopter losses in combat (as proven in Vietnam); the Black Shark's entire transmission presents a comparatively small target to ground fire. Kamov maintains that the co-axial drive assembly is built to survive hits from 23mm ammunition like the other vital parts of the helicopter. The zero native torque also allows the aircraft to be fairly immune to wind strength and direction, and to have an unsurpassed turn rate in all travel speed envelopes.

As the single seat configuration was considered too revolutionary to be discovered by NATO, false windows were painted on the first two prototypes. The "windows" evidently worked as the first western reports of the aircraft were wildly inaccurate. According to the Air Force Magazine Soviet Aerospace Almanac 1989, the "DoD states that this helicopter has not been observed carrying antitank guided weapons. Instead, it is thought to have a primary air-to-air role (an assessment that is not universally accepted). Like other combat helicopters, 'hokum' has a crew of two, in tandem, with an elevated rear seat."

The Ka-50 was the first helicopter fitted with a NPP Zvezda K-37-800 ejection seat for improved pilot survivability; this was also seen as a psychological factor enhancing the pilot's combat courage. Before the rocket in the ejection seat kicks in, rotor blades are blown away by explosive charges in the rotor disc and the canopy is similarly jettisoned.

The first Ka-50 prototype was nicknamed "Werewolf," however Kamov's official name for the type is "Black Shark." As the Soviet Union's collapse vastly reduced military spending before Ka-50 could go into full-scale production, a relatively small number of these aircraft have been built. Reportedly Ka-50's development took place in record time, as Kamov had the forethought of placing liaison engineers at major component suppliers and systems subcontractors.

The Ka-50 and its modifications have been chosen as the special forces support helicopter while Mi-28 has become main army's gunship. The production of Ka-50 was recommenced in 2006.

The aircraft carries a substantial load of weapons in four external hardpoints under the stub wings plus two on the wingtips, a total of some 2,300 kg depending on the mix. The main armament are the twelve laser-guided Vikhr anti-tank missiles with a maximum range of some 10 km. The laser guidance is reported to be virtually jam-proof and the system features automatic guidance to target enabling evasive movement immediately after missile launch. The fire control system automatically shares all target information among the four Black Sharks of a typical flight in real time, allowing one helicopter to engage a target spotted by another, and the system also can input target information from ground-based forward scouts with man-portable target designation gear. The integrated 30mm Shipunov 2A42 cannon is semi-rigidly fixed on the helicopter's side, movable only slightly in elevation and azimuth. The aircraft's agility allows the weapon control system to turn (the entire helicopter and) the cannon at the target acquired in the pilot's helmet sight about as fast as the cannon turret of the Apache or the Mi-28 turns. The semi-rigid mounting improves the cannon's accuracy, giving the 30mm a longer practical range and better hit ratio at medium ranges than with a free-turning turret mount.