Transport Plane

A Transport Plane is a type of Plane that is designed primarily (or solely) to move troops and/or cargo into and out of the battlefield. Transport Planes are typically very large (the largest vehicles in the game), very spacious, and use multiple propeller engines to stay aloft at a relatively slow speed.

For the most part, Transport Planes are used in ShackTac to make Paratrooper drops at the start of a mission, insert Reinforcements later on, or drop Crates at Resupply points. On rare occasions, Planes may be located by ground units and used to escape the map at the end of the mission. Most Transport Planes seen in ShackTac videos are scripted, using an AI pilot to fly along a pre-determined path.

Transport Plane models appearing in ShackTac include the C-130 Hercules, as well as several other less-recognizable models. They are not fundamentally different enough from one another for any distinction to matter in most cases.

Specifications and Design
Transport Planes are some of the most common type of Plane in the world, since all commercial airliners and cargo planes belong to this type. Unarmed and built for flight stability, they are not used for combat with the enemy but rather to move cargo and passengers in and out of combat.

To fulfill this purpose, the body of a Transport Plane is for the most part a hollow shell with enough internal space to carry the passengers or cargo. The tail of the plane usually features a door that can open into a ramp, allowing its cargo to be loaded and unloaded (though some smaller Transport Planes use a door on the side of the fuselage for the same purpose). When dropping personnel and materiel using parachutes, these can simply be thrown out the door.

Due to the size and weight of these aircraft, they require more than one or even two engines to stay aloft, as well as a pair of very large wings to generate sufficient lift. Most Transport Planes have 4 such engines, mounted on and wings and/or the top of the tail. In ShackTac, all Transport Planes use propeller engines. Transport Planes are therefore significantly slower and less maneuverable than Jets, and their size makes them an easy target for enemy AA fire. Thus, Transport Planes will try to avoid entering enemy-controlled airspace at all costs, and will fly at an altitude that makes targeting them from the ground difficult or impossible.

Roles
Transport Planes are used mostly for moving passengers and cargo into the battlefield, or for removing them from the battlefield. Due to the size and speed of Transport Planes, they cannot land on any surface other than a flat airfield, and these are rare. Thus, Transport Planes typically appear at the very start of the mission or the very end of it, unlike Transport Helicopters that can easily land to resupply troops or shuffle them around the battlefield.

Additionally, Transport Planes are commonly seen dropping Crates and Reinforcements from high altitude onto the battlefield.

Insertion
An Insertion can be performed by Transport Planes dropping Paratroopers into the Area of Operations. This allows placing ground units into enemy territory rapidly to achieve the element of surprise, but has plenty of drawbacks as well.

For such insertions, players may load into the Planes on the ground, or otherwise be Teleported directly into planes already in flight to the target. The planes will often be scripted to fly over the intended drop zone, and will trigger the dropping-off of the Paratroopers automatically after hitting their script triggers. The players then have to parachute to the ground safely to begin their mission. One or more Planes may be used to carry out the insertion, depending on the size of the planes and the size of the force they need to drop.

Once all players have been dropped, the planes will usually fly out of visual range and disappear (if scripted), abandoned by their pilots, or need to be flown back and landed at base. They serve no additional purpose later on.

Insertion by Transport Plane has the advantage of bypassing the enemy's front lines. Players may be able to hit some targets immediately after landing (taking the enemy completely by surprise), or establish themselves in a highly-defensible position to fend off enemy counter-attacks. Nevertheless, the first few moments after landing area extremely dangerous to the Paratroopers, as enemies could be in any direction and distance. Furthermore, for the first few minutes, players on the ground may struggle to reorganize themselves - or even find any friendlies at all - requiring them to use all sorts of methods to find their group and rally into an effective fighting force. Compare this to Transport Helicopter landings, where all friendlies will be well-organized immediately upon touching the ground.

Dropping Cargo
Transport Planes can drop Crates full of various supplies directly onto the battlefield from a high altitude. This is done by flying over the designated drop area and simply lobbing the crates overboard. The crates themselves are equipped with parachutes that open automatically, gliding down to the ground where friendly units can pick them up.

The practice of dropping supplies using Transport Planes is pretty much exclusive to ArmA 3 videos. The planes appear to be scripted, flying a straight path over a drop point designated by the Game Master and dropping their crates on cue, then flying off and (presumably) disappearing entirely. Commonly, several planes will be used to make the drop simultaneously.

When crates are dropped this way, players on the ground will need to observe the crates as they make their way to the ground, to determine the approximate landing point. Crates may sometimes be fitted with beacons that cause strobing blue circles to appear on the map, indicating the approximate position of each crate.

Note that the drops are not very accurate, and the crates may land some distance away from the ground forces. If the crates land too far away, the Game Master may issue another, closer drop to ensure that the players at least get something.

Dropping Reinforcements
As with cargo (above), Transport Planes can also drop Paratroopers into the battlefield mid-mission as Reinforcements for the ground force. This practice has become more common in ArmA 3, and appears to use the same type of scripted dropping commonly seen in Insertions - except there are passengers inside instead of crates.

This type of reinforcement method is quick to set up and does not apparently require any player to serve as a temporary pilot, contrary to reinforcement by Transport Helicopters. The ability to drop from a high altitude also significantly reduces risk to the aircraft themselves, such as when dropping troops into a battle in progress.

Dropping Vehicles
Though extremely rare, ShackTac Transport Planes have been seen dropping vehicles for friendlies to use. This is probably limited to light vehicles (e.g. Scout Vehicles such as the HMMWV). The vehicles are dropped uncrewed, and must then by recovered from the landing site and assigned actual crews (see Motorized Infantry).

Extraction
In a handful of videos - primarily E&E missions - players on the ground may be required to (or be lucky enough to) find a Transport Plane on an airfield, ready to take off and remove them from the battlefield. Whether this is the mission objective or a lucky happenstance, the end result is the same: The players take control of the aircraft and take-off themselves, hopefully reaching the edge of the map and ending the mission.

This sort of scenario is limited to missions where the players do not have a final objective in the Area of Operations itself, nor have an organized Extract method. In many cases, they will simply stumble onto the Transport Plane on an airfield, and might even have to find a way to refuel the plane in order to take off. One of the players will need to know how to power up and fly the aircraft without crashing. Though it is common courtesy to load up as many players as possible onto the plane before take-off, these missions are typically "every man for himself", and as such players may actually steal the plane with expediency rather than altruism in mind.

A few other missions have featured Transport Planes waiting for the players at a known location, with the mission essentially being to reach the planes alive and take off.

In any case, once the players have taken off and are sufficiently away from any possible enemy retaliation, the mission will conclude. Actually landing the plane does not seem to be required in any such circumstance.

Models
There are multiple models of Transport Planes, but for the most part they are all functionally identical.

The primary recognizable model is the C-130 "Hercules", a medium cargo plane used by many military forces around the world. It has a distinct nose bulge below the cockpit (usually painted black) and four propeller engines on wings high above the fuselage. Like all other cargo planes, the rear end of the fuselage opens into a ramp that allows loading and unloading cargo/passenger or throwing them out over a drop zone.

One interesting model that is unlike the rest is the Osprey, which is not a Plane per-se but a Plane/Helicopter hybrid. Its two large propeller engines can swivel from a horizontal position (for forward movement) to a vertical position (for hover, take-off and landing). It is about as large as a Chinook, and serves exclusively as a Transport Helicopter with optional Scout Helicopter duties.

Organization
Due to the rarity of Transport Planes and the way they are used, they have no standard organizational structure, callsigns, or special procedures associated with them beyond what is described above in this article. Their presence is barely acknowledged other than for the express purpose they serve within the specific mission.

Notable Examples
Transport Planes are common for dropping supplies, especially during the ArmA 3 era. The list below should include only examples of unusual use of Transport Planes, or unusual models used in this role.


 *  by Dslyecxi features air-dropped Wiesel AWC support vehicles, which are provided to the Paratroopers immediately following their Insertion.
 *  by Dslyecxi: The players are paradropped from Chinooks, followed by a C-130 dropping HMMWVs.