USAF Appears To Shelve C-130 Upgrade

Aviation Week and Space Technology ^ | 12/23/2009 | Amy Butler

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The U.S. Air Force appears to have halted the forthcoming competition to build C-130 Avionics Modernization Program (AMP) kits, a sign that this program could be terminating in the coming budget request for 2011.

On Dec. 16, the Air Force program office overseeing the C-130 AMP program issued a statement noting that the "government is finalizing the way forward on the C-130 AMP program" and the solicitation is "cancelled." The statement adds that "the government will readdress the [issue] once a way forward for the AMP program has been determined."

This is the latest chapter in the troubled $5.8 billion program. It began as an effort to standardize the cockpits and avionics of roughly 500 C-130s of about 13 different types, but due to cost and schedule overruns and development problems, the Pentagon scaled the program back in 2005 to 222. The plan now stands at 221 aircraft needing the kit, owing to an aircraft loss, and another 129 C-130s in service also require some kind of upgrade to gain access to preferred air routes.

The Air Force chief of staff, Gen. Norton Schwartz, said in the fall that the service may not be able to afford the AMP program. Air Force officials declined to cite a reason for the Dec. 16 decision other than program cost. In August, David Van Buren, acting assistant Air Force secretary for acquisition, said questions about the program's future were "not an issue of performance."

Boeing won the competition for the C-130 AMP over Lockheed Martin, BAE and L-3. However, a pall fell over the decision when former senior Air Force acquisition official Darleen Druyun admitted to steering contracts unfairly to Boeing, including the C-130 AMP.

[Veggie Todd]

They have to have money to pay for the Soviet Medical Plan....

[CodeToad]

There goes one of my contracts. I guess if I get free deathcare instead so I die faster I won’t need the money.

[DoughtyOne]

The Defense Department will look like a turkey carcus on the day after Thanksgiving before Obama is done.

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

I agree

[DoughtyOne]

Thank you.

[kinsman redeemer]

South Pole, C-130 Hercules (ski-equipped) memories: Last flight out - watched it from the surface, January 1983. No aircraft, save the C-141 mid-winter Starlifter in June, until the U.S. Navy's VXE-6 (USARP) wonderful return to base in November. A beautiful sight - on both occassions, btw.

[Rembrandt]

Thanks O’Bummer!

[maine-iac7]

My son-in-law’s first few years in the navy was under the last few years of billy jefferson C -

He flew P-3’s. By that time, the military had been so stripped down that less than half the fleet could fly - the others used for parts.

Now he's with the Coast Guard - and flies the C-130 Hercules.

And my grandson just returned to Afghanistan -

Pray for our incredible troops that now must serve under such a PO(TU)S.

[Feckless]

Damned fine aircraft, one of only three I ever felt safe on (C-141 and UH1-N were the other two).
The Air Force gets really upset when you get one dirty. About 45 of us soiled one after sitting on the runway in Cairo for 2+ hours waiting on a C-141. It was 130+F, engines running, everyone turning green.... one finally lost it and it was like Linda Blair day at an Exorcist Convention.... ahh the memories.