Dropship

The UNSC's ubiquitous Pelican dropship.

A dropship, sometimes referred to as an assault boat, shuttlecraft or troop carrier, is a atmospheric and/or exoatmospheric transport aircraft of small proportions chiefly designed to ferries military assets and hardware into combat. The primary technical definition of a dropship is a military logistical support/deployment platform that can deliver (or extract) troops from space platforms to the surface of a planet (and vice verse), but dropships also serve as gunships and utility craft, providing ground operations with close air support in addition to ferrying infantry and matériel between combat zones within terrestrial environments. Occasionally, dropships are also used for boarding operations. Some dropships are designed to carry specific types of cargo, such as supplies or prefabricated structures.

Known dropship types

In the Covenant

• Type-25 "Spirit" Troop Carrier - A dropship commonly used to transport matériel, though also used to transport personnel.
• Phantom dropships - The primary Covenant dropship.
  • Type-44 "Phantom" Troop Carrier - A dropship supplanted by a newer model, the Type-52, which was ubiquitous later in the Human-Covenant War. The Covenant remnant use the Type-44 as their primary dropship, likely due to the scarcity of the newer model.
  • Type-52 "Phantom" Troop Carrier - A more heavily armed version of the Type-44 typically used to transport personnel, though also used to transport matériel.
    • Type-52 "Phantom" Gunboat - Exoatmospheric combat craft and a variant of the Type-52 Troop Carrier. It is used for space-based engagements
• Type-56 "Lich" Ground Support/Ultra Heavy Deployment Platform - The largest airborne deployment platform, the Type-56 boasts heavy armament and is capable of mass deployments of up to forty soldiers.

In the UNSC

• Pelican dropships - The primary UNSC dropship.
  • D77-TC Pelican - The standard Pelican dropship.
    • D77H-TCI Pelican - A more recent, upgraded model of the Pelican.
    • D77C-NMPD Pelican - A law enforcement variant of the Pelican.
      • Troop deployment pod - Overhang extension to increase passenger load capacity.
  • D79-TC Pelican - Became the UNSC's standard dropship by 2557; replacing the D77-TC and D77H-TCI models.
• D82-EST Darter - A dropship, similar to the Albatross, used to deliver supplies directly to forward bases.
• D96-TCE Albatross - A larger, less common dropship used to transport large quantities of matériel and large groups of personnel.
• Pod - A very large, heavy dropship used for transporting prefabricated structures to groundside locations.

Atmospheric only

• UH-144 Falcon - The primary air-to-ground support and troop transport aircraft of the UNSC.