What would happen if a modern fighter got fully EMP'd?

[Jeb]

This is a theoretical based on something from the new Godzilla movie trailer. Stick with me. ;D


Being relatively airframe-agnostic, meaning anything from the FBW era (let's say F-16 to F-35), dude, what would happen! if a combat jet in typical operating circumstances (cruising speed, normal altitude) took a full-on EMP pulse that zorched everything electrical on board? We will assume that it's not resolvable before metal meets surface.


[list type=decimal]
[*]Does the jet retain enough stability to fly/glide nosefirst until it impacts?
[*]Would it tumble or otherwise get out of sorts if it stalled?
[*]Can the pilot eject if the jet is EMP'd?
[*]Does ejection destabilize the bird and cause it to tumble?
[/list]
I know, I'm trying to apply some science & engineering to a giant monster movie, but I'm curious.

 

[sublight_]

They didn't get EMP'd. Legendary didn't license all of Toho's giant monsters so, their "giant flying bird thing" is essentially a new version of "Rodan". The fighters got caught in a massive downdraft or pressure wave of some sort and suffered what looks like a flame-out.

Gareth would rather go with something "plausable-ish" over an EMP monster....

And in the case of a real EMP, the pilot should be able to reset a master fuse and "reboot" the system unless the bird goes into a GLOC inducing tumble first.

 

[sferrin]

They didn't get EMP'd. Legendary didn't license all of Toho's giant monsters so, their "giant flying bird thing" is essentially a new version of "Rodan". The fighters got caught in a massive downdraft or pressure wave of some sort and suffered what looks like a flame-out.

Gareth would rather go with something "plausable-ish" over an EMP monster....

Well there are things like electric eels and catfish. Why not an EMP Rodan? B)

 

[sublight_]

They didn't get EMP'd. Legendary didn't license all of Toho's giant monsters so, their "giant flying bird thing" is essentially a new version of "Rodan". The fighters got caught in a massive downdraft or pressure wave of some sort and suffered what looks like a flame-out.

Gareth would rather go with something "plausable-ish" over an EMP monster....

Well there are things like electric eels and catfish. Why not an EMP Rodan? B)

It's not a question of the theoretically plausibility. It is a question of the aesthetic the director is trying to go for. You can look at his earlier work to get a taste for the kind of scenario that he likes to create. I just don't believe he will go the EMP monster route.

 

[Jeb]

OK, well, first, please just entertain the question because I wondered about it in general and not just in the context of the movie.


Buuuut, also, in the dialogue, Cranston's panicking about getting sent back to the stone age, and a big fat walking EMP pulse would do a pretty reasonable job of that, so it's where the idea came from.


The trailers so far have been amazing, haven't they?

 

[sferrin]

They didn't get EMP'd. Legendary didn't license all of Toho's giant monsters so, their "giant flying bird thing" is essentially a new version of "Rodan". The fighters got caught in a massive downdraft or pressure wave of some sort and suffered what looks like a flame-out.

Gareth would rather go with something "plausable-ish" over an EMP monster....

Well there are things like electric eels and catfish. Why not an EMP Rodan? B)

It's not a question of the theoretically plausibility. It is a question of the aesthetic the director is trying to go for. You can look at his earlier work to get a taste for the kind of scenario that he likes to create. I just don't believe he will go the EMP monster route.

Well he better not go for too much realism. I want my Godzilla to blow fire. ;D

 

[sublight_]

Well he better not go for too much realism. I want my Godzilla to blow fire. ;D

I promise you will get to see plenty of nuke breath action, and a lot of attempts to kill him with nukes in the Pacific (via 50's - 60's nuke tests)

 

[Dragon029]

On topic of the question:

1. Depends entirely on the airframe, but it's unlikely considering that many / most airframes are now designed to have a negative static stability (meaning unless there are computers to correct the surfaces, the plane will try to flip).

2. Depends entirely on the airframe, but the tumble would likely be more of an oscillation after a while.

3. Yes; that's a physical operation (if the EMP was strong enough, I wonder if that'd also set off the det charges in the ejection system?).

4. Depends on the airframe, but it does alter the centre of gravity and kick the nose down a little; probably not enough to cause much of a difference to anything though. There was one case where ejection caused an F-106 to exit a stall (it was slightly nose-up in a flat spin; ejection made enough of a change in axis [and change in angular momentum] that it stopped the flat spin and allowed the plane to glide into a field, as it had static stability).