Posted on 03/18/2010 11:09:42 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Well, no one can say the Lockheed JSF team hasn’t had a good week. First came the hover and short takeoff and short landing. Today, they capped it with the plane’s first true vertical landing.
The Marines were officially happy. “Having the F-35B perform its first vertical landing underscores the reality of the Marine Corps achieving its goal of an all STOVL force,” said Lt. Gen. George Trautman, deputy commandant for aviation. “Being able to operate and land virtually anywhere, the STOVL JSF is a unique fixed wing aircraft that can deploy, co-locate, train and fight with Marine ground forces while operating from a wider range of bases ashore and afloat than any other TacAir platform.”
Of course, there are always skeptics out there, thank goodness. “I’ll look forward to the STOVL ops,” Winslow Wheeler, at the Center for Defense Information and all-about-town defense budget guru. They say in their statement they will perform at ‘unprepared fields.’ By ‘field’ do they mean cow pasture or Hartfield Atlanta International. I suspect the latter, but they’ll sell the former.”
The plane, BF-1, took off at 80 knots using less than 1,000 feet of runway from the Pax River strip at 1:09 p.m. Then the pilot brought the plane 150 feet above the airfield, hovered and then descended to the runway
(Excerpt) Read more at dodbuzz.com ...
A cabal of fruits, nuts and flakes.
Its interesting that the DoD Buzz would take info from them
And I agree.
Oh, you'll have a gun alright. It is a dealer-installed option, and it is channeling the early days of the F-4 Phantom II by coming in the form of a centerline gun pod. If it's any consolation, the F-35B/C gun pod carries more ammunition than the F-35A's internal gun.
Maryland PING!
Give me my triple redundant, “slow” slug of a plane that’s really a tanking in the ski A-10.
Could not agree with you more though there are many on this board that will trash such thoughts as those of arm chair flight simulator pilot wannabes.
This airplane is a dumb idea and mostly fluff and stuff gimmickry. One engine for a carrier based airplane is just dumb and anemic. Yes, we had them before but we replaced them for a reason. Where I come from two is one and one is none.
The old adage of never put all your eggs in one basket has not been invalidated.
You are correct, there is a scam in here somewhere. I do’t seem to see a lot of Harrier gun camera runs or ground support stories anywhere. Strange isn’t it?
Marine Air doesn't belong on CVNs. Marine Corps squadrons are attached to CVWs because those buffoons at NAVAIR can't adequately man or fund their TOEs.
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