Message posted by Andre' M. Dall'au on July 05, 2009 at 3:49:11 PST:
Whatever it is unless it supports very top secret work it would have been built elsewhere. Any T&E of less sensitive projects would be located in an area that would not be so difficult to support, so the purpose of this HAS to be to train or develop some of the projects already there. That would narrow it down to aircraft projects. Since it is off the flight line, actual aircraft would be impractical. UAV's need lots of training by pilots - that why they have simulators. However before the UAV's get airborne the "pilots" have to be able to manuever on the ground. The track could very easily be a training track for UAV pilots to learn how to taxi their unmanned aircraft. The small and large radius turns are flat and not banked like runways. It looks like new pilots are being trained to taxi, perform high speed runs (similar to take off) and high speed deceleration (similar to landing) as well as emergencies requiring high speed turns and stops. All it would require is a remote controlled wheeled vehicle that simulates the ground characteristics of the UAV. All this would explain the lack of banking on the tracks, the different radius turns and the long straightaways.
In Reply to: Re: Training Facility posted by JoeinTX on July 04, 2009 at 23:49:29 PST:
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