Why don't airports use steam catapults and transverse arrestor cables, like they do on aircraft carriers, for extra short take-off & landing?

1. Airports could be pretty tiny with runways no longer than a football field
2. Takeoff and landing (takeoff especially) would be *much* more exciting
3. Airlines could charge people more money because the experience would be much more fun
4. It would save a lot of fuel with much less taxiing around the airfield, and much less fuel used during the takeoff phase

It would take redesign of the aircraft, and burning alot of some kind of fuel to power the steam generators. Alot of maintenance on those things to. Doesn't sound very feasible to me.

I guess this must have seemed funny when you thought of it, huh?
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Not needed for civilian airports, as developers know the acreage required for aircraft up to the USAF/Lockheed California C-5, VKSR/Antonov-124SM, and comparable superheavy transports. Emergency arresting gear are installed at some major airports for military aircraft to trap on short runways, or those with obstructions beyond anticipated rollout.

The military does have requirements for such hardware as ye describe; the United States Marine Corps routinely deploys solid-rocket catapults, hydraulic arresting gear, and aircraft-carrier-type glideslope displays for temporary Expeditionary Aircraft Stations with fixed-wing jet assignments (excepting perhaps the Lockheed Martin F-35B, a lift-fan-equipped STOVL supersonic attack aircraft, and the British Aerospace AV-8A/C and McDonnell Douglas AV-8B, thrust-vectoring subsonic attack aircraft).

You took one too many hits off that blunt.

If STOL airliners were wanted by the market, the Dash 7 would still be in production.

The wegth of nowadays commercial airplanes are far to much for any cable to handle. One little unplanned little stop produced by the cable migh unbalance the plane which results into a crash in such a short timing that nobody can react. And no airport/personnel can handle that risk in today s enormous number of planes going arrival daily. And that didn't include the customers comfort yet.

What does this have to do with weddings?

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