September 2011
Iraq had frozen the $4.2 billion deal earlier this year amid the Arab Spring pro-democracy uprisings, but the prospects were “promising” for the contract to now move ahead, General Russ Handy, head of the US air forces in Iraq, said. “They are seeking to buy a larger number of F16s (than) they had originally, up to 36. This first letter of offer and acceptance is for 18 of them, so ...
Category: Military Aviation
Pointing to a sheer wastage of public funds, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in its report slammed the Ministry of Defence and the Navy for buying war planes that do not have weapons. It also pointed a finger at the Indian Air Force (IAF) for having ‘let off’ three of its officers who caused a loss of Rs 302 crore when a sensitive aerostat radar got damaged. The CAG, ...
Category: MiG News
Lockheed Martin has started final assembly on the last F-22A Raptor ordered by the US Air Force, but the delivered fleet remains grounded over concerns about the pilot’s breathing system inside the cockpit. Lockheed has mated the fuselage sections of the F-22A with USAF serial number 09-4195. In final assembly, the company’s workers in Marietta, Georgia, will instal the wings, tails, landing gear and Pratt & Whitney F119 engines, among ...
Category: Military Aviation
Boeing announced it has been awarded a one-year, $2.9 million contract by the U.S. Air Force to develop and validate a modification of the A-10 aircraft’s Digital Video Audio Data Recorder (DVADR). The modification will provide a near-term solution to supportability issues with a major subcomponent in the DVADR system. The contract is a task order under the umbrella of the A-10 Thunderbolt Life-Cycle Program Support (TLPS) contract that is ...
Category: Military Aviation
An aging MiG-31 fighter jet with loaded fuel tanks rammed into the ground at full speed and exploded early Tuesday near the city of Perm, killing both pilots, officials said. This is the second MiG-31 crash in less than a year, and the Defense Ministry immediately banned MiG-31 flights pending the outcome of an investigation. The military also grounded the jet following the previous incident in November. The fighter jet ...
Category: MiG News
It sounds like the F-22s are coming back, but that doesn’t mean the Air Force has determined what caused pilots to return from flying with antifreeze in their blood and propane in their lungs. Defense News is reporting that the four-month grounding of the F-22 fleet will soon be lifted and that a meeting scheduled last Friday would determine if there would be any restrictions that remain on the Raptors. ...
Category: Military Aviation
Sep
07
Yak 42 crashed in Russia
At least 45 people died on Wednesday afternoon when a plane carrying the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl ice hockey team crashed during take-off near Yaroslavl, some 250 km from Moscow, emergencies officials said. Two people survived the crash, investigators said. The cause of the accident has not yet been established. Eight members of the crew were among the dead. The Yak-42 plane was carrying the team to Minsk, the Belarusian capital, for ...
Category: Russian Aviation
The November 2010 crash of a U.S. Air Force F-22 was caused by a malfunction with the aircraft engine’s bleed air system, an industry source said. The pilot, Capt. Jeff “Bong” Haney of the 525th Fighter Squadron, was killed in the accident. An Air Force accident report said the F-22, tail number 06-4125, had a bleed air problem that caused both the stealth fighter jet’s Environmental Control System (ECS) and ...
Category: Military Aviation
When the six F/A-18 Hornets in the U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels flight demonstration team thrill the crowds at the Naval Air Station Patuxent River Air Expo in Maryland this weekend, they’ll be soaring on biofuel. Each of the six Hornets will be powered by a 50/50-blend of jet fuel and camelina-based biofuel, according to a Navy press release. Camelina is a high-oil flowering plant grown in rotation on land used ...
Category: Military Aviation
The budget wars are heating up when a senior senator starts attacking weapons programs important to other legislators in his own party. That’s what happened yesterday, when Senator Saxby Chambliss assailed Pentagon purchases of Boeing’s carrier-based F/A-18 Super Hornet, saying the plane is “obsolete” and “will be of limited to no value in any future threat scenario.” In a letter to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, Chambliss argued that if ...
Category: Military Aviation
As a hope of making another great leap in improving South Korea’s military might, South Korea’s first surveillance airplane, known as Airborne Early Warning and Control plane, arrived at an Air Force base on Aug. 1. The Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) in Seoul said that a Boeing E-737 early-warning and control aircraft landed at the Air Force base in Gimhae, South Gyeongsang, after completing tests by South Korean Air ...
Category: Military Aviation
