Posted on 02/26/2007 2:47:19 PM PST by SubGeniusX
Six Lockheed F-22 Raptors have Y2K-esque glitch of their own over the Pacific
Lockheed’s F-22 Raptor is the most advanced fighter in the world with its stealth capabilities, advanced radar, state of the art weapons systems and ultra-efficient turbofans which allow the F-22 to "supercruise" at supersonic speeds without an afterburner. The Raptor has gone up against the best that the US Air Force and Navy has to offer taking out F-15s, F-16s and F/A-18 Super Hornets during simulated war games in Alaska. The Raptor-led "Blue Air" team was able to rack up an impressive 241-to-2 kill ratio during the exercise against the "Red Air" threat -- the two kills on the blue team were from the 30-year old F-15 teammates and not the new Raptors.
But while the simulated war games were a somewhat easy feat for the Raptor, something more mundane was able to cripple six aircraft on a 12 to 15 hours flight from Hawaii to Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, Japan. The U.S. Air Force's mighty Raptor was felled by the International Date Line (IDL).
When the group of Raptors crossed over the IDL, multiple computer systems crashed on the planes. Everything from fuel subsystems, to navigation and partial communications were completely taken offline. Numerous attempts were made to "reboot" the systems to no avail.
Luckily for the Raptors, there were no weather issues that day so visibility was not a problem. Also, the Raptors had their refueling tankers as guide dogs to "carry" them back to safety. "They needed help. Had they gotten separated from their tankers or had the weather been bad, they had no attitude reference. They had no communications or navigation," said Retired Air Force Major General Don Shepperd. "They would have turned around and probably could have found the Hawaiian Islands. But if the weather had been bad on approach, there could have been real trouble.”
"The tankers brought them back to Hawaii. This could have been real serious. It certainly could have been real serious if the weather had been bad," Shepperd continued. "It turned out OK. It was fixed in 48 hours. It was a computer glitch in the millions of lines of code, somebody made an error in a couple lines of the code and everything goes."
Luckily for the pilots behind the controls of the Raptors, they were not involved in a combat situation. Had they been, it could have been a disastrous folly by the U.S. Air Force to have to admit that their aircraft which cost $125+ million USD apiece were knocked out of the sky due to a few lines of computer code. "And luckily this time we found out about it before combat. We got it fixed with tiger teams in about 48 hours and the airplanes were flying again, completed their deployment. But this could have been real serious in combat," said Shepperd.
Not being able to acquire GPS sats is different from a software bug induced crash. No GPS maping system launches with GPS sats being recieved, it takes at least a few seconds, or maybe a minute or two, so I seriously doubt the lack of GPS would kill the thing entirely.
Oh. They would also start the aircraft in shelters on occasion, where GPS would never penetrate, so obviously it would run systems without it.
yeah yeah yeah. Operating keyboard before engaging brain....
[I'm always screwing up lat/lon (have to think of that book "Longitude" to keep them straight) but where did I come up with +-190???]
For a fact all the F-22s returned, and news reports the day after it happened said it was a "software issue". I saw some blogs by military types talking about the "date line" issue before the story hit the media, so I wouldn't doubt it happened.
If this did happen, it would be exactly the kind of thing the military would *not* publicize. Not only because of the embarrassment, but also to prevent tipping off the world about our weaknesses. I saw a video when I was in the Air Force 25 years ago that gave a very similar scenario as a reason why even apparently trivial information can tip off the bad guys about major components of our capability, and thus these "little" things are often classified.
At least give out a Tard ping! lolz
Yeah, if you work for them. When they took over my facility, my contract came with it much to their irritation. I am not a Lockheed employee, hence they treat me like dirt. (They have been caught telling little white lies about me to my employers. Too bad for Lockheed I had witnesses which consisted of their very own employees)
I'd rather not go into specific details. Suffice to say that they took over my facility, and when they did that, my outside contract came with it, much to their irritation. I am not a Lockheed employee, hence they treat me like dirt. They have stabbed me in the back.
What percentage of errors are found in code review? If it's more than 10% then code reviews are worthwhile. With millions of lines of code errors, will get through. The more subtle, the harder they are to find. That's why the only acceptable means of validation is thorough real world testing.
Nature sides with the hidden flaw.
The F-22 uses Windows!?...Oh, nooooooo, we're all dooooooomed!!
I was curious to that also.What would happen if an electromagnetic pulse were to hit.Common sense dictates some type of backup system should or would be in place it would seem.Ah,that confusing common sense thing again.My bad!
LOL!!!
”Not being able to acquire GPS sats is different from a software bug induced crash. No GPS maping system launches with GPS sats being recieved, it takes at least a few seconds, or maybe a minute or two, so I seriously doubt the lack of GPS would kill the thing entirely.”
I understand it is different but wouldn’t the end result be similar without a satellite to give them the information they need, many of their systems would be un-operational.
Would the plane be able to hold up in a dog fight basically could they even find their targets without a satellite? I would assume being a stealth aircraft they wouldn’t want to use on-board radar.
I would suspect in about 10 years (give or take a few years) taking out satellites will not be a difficult task by China and Russia given they both have the capability today.
Thanks again
I don't mind 'doubting the veracity' of something but I'll be damned if I'm going to 'don't the varsity'! Unless I'm stuned, of course. (if this isn't funny yet, search for 'stuned' on FR)
I don't think so. Code reviews are valuable when a number of people can bring their experiences to bear. The idea is that it's best to find problems early... cheaper and easier to fix.
I forget the statistics, but I think something like one in four lines of code have an initial bug.
Unit testing catches most of them.
Integration testing the majority of remainder.
Acceptance testing some more.
Operational test and evaluation, a tiny few more.
The on rushing ground reveals the ones you've missed.
I am sorry, I am not talking about a hiccup. I am asking about how dependent our military is on satellites today. In a ‘what if’ scenario.
The Lacrosse Stripper (does she have a name?) is good reason why you 'don't the varsity', I guess.
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