New Unit Idea - Vehicle Transport Plane

  • New unit suggestion - Vehicle Transport Plane

    Hi!

    When responding to out-of-my-area large scale alliance events, my units take a really long time to get there (My main stations are on an Italian Island, so they have to ferry out and go around all Italy), they can even take +18hrs to reach the north-most part of Italy, and it really annoys me because I run out of units for days, or sometimes my vehicles get 3/4 there and then the event is done because I took too much time.

    I believe I am not the only one to have this kind of issue, and I wanted to suggest a new unit to go around this problem: A Vehicle Transport Plane

    Many countries have these kinds of plane, where they can hold many vehicles (also personeel and other cargo) and get dispatched to large scale civil protection-related emergencies; eg: Italian Air Force has a few C130-J/C-27Js that they use to transport cargo and vehicles to these kind of requests, same goes with Italian Civil Protection and other countries, including USA and EU.

    Details

    Name: Transport Plane

    Category: Firefighting

    Cost: 1,000,000 Credits

    Maximum vehicle capacity: 8 vehicles

    How would it work: The plane can be stored at the Firefighting Plane Station, and you can select your destination (not sure how would this work, an option can be to just go straight to the mission/staging point, while another option would be to make another temporary structure, like a "temporary airfield" which you can displace only one at a time and it would work like a staging point) then you can select which vehicles to load on the plane; the selected vehicles will enter Status 6 and drive to the Firefighting Plane Station, where they will board the plane, and once all vehicles have boarded the planes will take off and reach its destination; Once landed to the mission, the vehicles will disembark the plane and you can use them as you normally would. Once you are done with the mission, you can select the plane and make it return to its original station, carrying all its vehicles; once it has landed, the vehicles can go back to their respective stations.

    I know that this unit is pretty hard to implement in-game, but it would really save a lot of time (and credits also, since you are basically losing credits by not responding to the calls).

    Many things would probably have to be changed by the Devs to make it balanced, but it would make a good addition in the game in my opinion :)

  • That’s a really interesting concept! I can see this being useful for international task forces as well, especially if the devs implement that USAR vehicle request ;) However, I think 8 vehicles is a bit much. C-27Js definitely can’t carry that much, and even C-130s would likely struggle beyond 2 or 3. I think 3 vehicles would be much more realistic. It’s also possible that it could accommodate more small vehicles than large (for instance, 4 Type 5-7 brush units, 2 type 1 engines, or only 1 heavy rescue or platform truck.)

  • just did a bit of research - a C-17 can carry 1 M1 Abrams (which is 55 tons) and a C-130 can carry 2, so you can figure out carrying cap. based on the numbers

    You may have your aircraft wrong- the C-17 can carry 1 M1 (you were right there), and the C-5 can carry 2. The C-130 cannot carry an M1 as it is smaller than the C-17 and its cargo hold cannot accommodate an M1. The hold of a C-130 is about 40 feet long, 10 feet wide, and 9 feet high. A quick look at the internet says that the average fire engine is about 35 feet long, 9 feet wide, and 9 feet high. It would be a tight fit- and platform trucks wouldn’t fit, as they’re taller and often longer. Now, let’s look at the C-17. At 88x18x12.5, we could fit 2 type 1 fire engines or a single aerial aboard. That’s still not much on a fire where airlifting apparatus is necessary, impressive as it is. So now we turn to the C-5- at 121x13.5x19, it’ll be possible to fit 3 type 1 engines or 2 smaller aerials. Obviously very few departments have access to aircraft capable of lifting a single fire engine, and there are VERY few situations where airlifting apparatus makes sense. I’d would be fun to have, but I don’t think it makes sense for us to add.

  • You may have your aircraft wrong- the C-17 can carry 1 M1 (you were right there), and the C-5 can carry 2. The C-130 cannot carry an M1 as it is smaller than the C-17 and its cargo hold cannot accommodate an M1. The hold of a C-130 is about 40 feet long, 10 feet wide, and 9 feet high. A quick look at the internet says that the average fire engine is about 35 feet long, 9 feet wide, and 9 feet high. It would be a tight fit- and platform trucks wouldn’t fit, as they’re taller and often longer. Now, let’s look at the C-17. At 88x18x12.5, we could fit 2 type 1 fire engines or a single aerial aboard. That’s still not much on a fire where airlifting apparatus is necessary, impressive as it is. So now we turn to the C-5- at 121x13.5x19, it’ll be possible to fit 3 type 1 engines or 2 smaller aerials. Obviously very few departments have access to aircraft capable of lifting a single fire engine, and there are VERY few situations where airlifting apparatus makes sense. I’d would be fun to have, but I don’t think it makes sense for us to add.

    Cargo can be accessed at both ends of the aircraft. It has a maximum payload capacity of 130 t. It can carry two M1A2 Abrams main battle tanks, or 7-10 8×8 armored vehicles (Stryker or LAV-25), or 16 HMMWVs.Mar 8, 2021 .... from a google search

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