Britain’s new multi-billion pound stealth fighter programme has been struck by more technical difficulties which left the entire fleet grounded at the weekend after engine trouble triggered “an in-flight emergency”.
The pilot declared an in-flight emergency and landed safely back at base at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma in Arizona, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Britain has said it will buy at least 48 of the same F-35B variants to be flown from its new aircraft carriers and also to be based at RAF Marham. The UK has already taken delivery of three aircraft and they are being tested by British pilots in the US.The Pentagon grounded all variants of the F-35 on Friday until engines could be inspected.The F-35 is lauded as the most advanced fighter ever built, but the programme has been dogged by cost overruns and delays as well as accusations of poor performance. Earlier this year, Michael Gilmore, the US military’s chief weapons tester, complained about the plane’s software and said the F-35 was proving less reliable and harder to maintain than expected.British military chiefs say “teething problems” are to be expected during the development of sophisticated new aircraft and they will be ironed out before the planes become operational in 2018.Britain originally said it would take 138 of the planes, but the Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond now says a decision on how many to buy will not be made until after next year’s defence review.US officials on the F-35 programme said the temporary grounding was “prudent action". After engine-by-engine checks, most of the 104-strong fleet was cleared to fly again by late Saturday, but two other engines were declared to have “suspect findings”.Frank Kendall, the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer, said last week the plane was not yet as reliable as hoped. He said there had been “some marginal evidence of improvement, but it’s not enough.”The F-35B will reportedly make its international debut on July 4 for the naming ceremony of the 65,000-ton Queen Elizabeth at the Rosyth dockyard, though the MoD has not confirmed this. It will also fly at the Fairford and Farnborough air shows next month.A MoD spokeswoman said of the latest fault: “There is nothing unusual about this as the F-35B is still in its test and training phase."Routine flight trials were temporarily suspended overnight but have now resumed. These fifth generation stealth aircraft will be the most advanced jets in our inventory and will far outreach the capability that was held by the third generation Harriers."
Japan is considering buying the F-Three-Fives...
j-pan ain't got 3 billion dollars
The current government will buy them no matter what (yes, they're the same guys who are crazy enough to remove the Article 9/Self Defence rule). That's part of their and US' important strategy to give China another middle finger over the current Asia's arms race.
That's it, we're all doomed.
Bbc.com
Glad the pilot landed safely.
Luckily for the pilot the software must of held up, if it had crashed (as it is prone to during a possible failure of anything aboard the aircraft), he would of been looking at a potential eject. Just look at what that axed software programmer for the F-35 program has to say about its onboard OS...
Just say no to single engine fighters.
Why? The F-16 does Just Fine..
So does the Harrier and the Mirage family
so, the Typhoon has a incident, it's a comment. But if it's aviations favorite whiping boy, then it gets it's own news post...
The Typhoon has a good track record. The F-35 has literally brought nothing to the table so far.
I'm interested to hear your perspective on the F-35, judging from your posts you have a differing opinion from most of us here.
Nothing to the table, then why doesn't the raptor get more beatings? Also, not that much news on the Typhoon at all, let alone faults.
And My opinion is of an Armchair admiral who military knowledge comes from vidgit games and wiki pages. There is nothing I could say that won't get discounted as rubbish.
I just don't like universal, almost blind haeting of something, while blind gushing about other things, along with what ever facts I bring to get discounted.
Hmmm. "Blind" is an interesting term, especially when there is a rather large amount of factual evidence supporting where some opinions are coming from.
I think it is unfair to discount the Raptor, as it was a project's end goal. Whether or not the new capabilities of the F-22 were already being incorporated in other aircraft by the time it finally entered production is besides the point, as the experience and knowledge gained by the project was pretty invaluable, and it was within an acceptable price range (given the US DoD's budget). Not only did they learn from the aircraft but they also had the sense to halt production until a time when F-22s might actually be needed. The F-35 is different due to the fact its end goal is to incorporate the features of nearly every aircraft in the US arsenal (within reason) into one "Super plane", which as you can imagine, is really, really dumb. As for knowledge learned? I think cost overruns have actually managed to put a price tag on that "invaluable" knowledge I mentioned before.
No, that part I don't discount. I'll even +1 you for being knowledgeable about logical reasoning. I just don't this this warrants a news post. It Seems to excesive for just the latest in a long line of what ever train wreck the F-35 is.
I'm a supporter of Even Hating. If sh!t breaks on something I like I'll call it out too. But here is seams like every time the F-35 is brought up, even when the conversation is not about it, it is deragetated. All over, everywhere here if there is even the inkling of F-35, Real or digital form there is a instant haet comment on it and a down vote for any thing otherwise.
TL;DR Go Dis the -35, just stop doing it everywhere on everything!
Heh, I think it's become a bit of a pet fall guy. The F-35 does mirror quite well a lot of the thinking that goes on behind US defence contractors these days, hence the flak (pun not intended) that it receives from aviation critics, uneducated plebs, and disgruntled US taxpayers.
Your stance on "even hating" as you put it is a good attitude to have. Not that you need me to tell you that, but it is admirable nonetheless.
But to end my line of thought, Does it really need it's own post just for the purpose of giving you all another place to hate on it? Doesn't that happen anyways? Will we be having a post for when someone buys an old soviet bucket? Weill we be making post for what ever plane someone haets?
I'm asking not to make a presidnt, It's easy with the -35, but thinks can quickly spiral out of control...Like the -35.
Fair point. It's actually kind of refreshing having a gamer's honest perspective instead of someone who pretends to know a whole heap.
I am what I am and that's all that I am.
But...If it's Cesna 152's you ask about, I flew a few of those!
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