The DOD operational test office has recommended that it is too soon to start pilot training at Eglin Air Force Base due to safety issues with the program. A delay of 10 months is recommended until the results of flight test are more mature.
Doing pilot training too soon can cause problems because the trainees are not rated test pilots. This can cause serious problems if the F-35 is indeed under-tested because of an attempt to rush things through the system so vendors can get their performance bonus.
The F-16 suffered a similar problem when it was rushed into service; including poor documentation of aircraft performance. This resulted in a test-pilot-by-any-other-name problem which ended up getting some people killed.
4 comments:
Can the last para be verified? I haven't heard about that. I flew against the F-16 during ET&E and was operational on the F-16 in 1980. I don't know anybody should have been killed due to this.
First squadron at Hill AFB.
Go to F-16.net and look up stories on the topic by "Gums."
Bio on Gums. http://goo.gl/wQujE
You have to dig into some of the forum posts to find some of the bad (along with the good) of standing up the squadron at Hill, but they are there.
Having said that; yes the F-16 is a great aircraft, however, making regular operational pilots into test pilots by any other name, has obvious risks.
Don't know about the F16 so I won't comment on that.
I do think this is the right decision for F35, the program is years late anyways, so why put regular pilots in the cockpit before a big chunk of testing is done? You don't really lose anything but you avoid some hot rod pilot taking your spanking brand new very expense fighter out and digging a freaking big hole with it. That's the last thing this program needs, already see the headlines: "Most expensive fighter jet kills pilot, testing not finished yet." It's the newspapers and lawyers wet dream.
With the pitifully small amount of actual flight testing that's occurred in anything approaching a battle ready F-35 (Block 3 our higher)another 10 months might prevent a serious accident.
Still if you didn't know about the recommended delay in flight training the article I've posted below would make you think that everything is wonderful in JSF world (LOL).
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2011/10/air-force-f-35-pilots-await-go-ahead-flight-ops-102811w/
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