EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. (AFNS) -- Air Force officials said the unveiling of the F-35A Lightning II joint strike fighter was a "historic occasion" during a rollout ceremony here Aug. 26.
The F-35A, on display during the ceremony, was delivered here in July by Lt. Col. Eric Smith, the Air Force's first F-35 pilot.
"This is indeed a new era," said Gen. Edward A. Rice Jr., the Air Education and Training Command commander and host of the milestone event.
The aircraft was developed in a span of only 15 years, one-eighth of the 118 total years powered flight has existed, he said. The F-35 brings advanced technological capabilities for the future and the nation's defense -- something the general explained was clearly unimaginable when Orville and Wilbur Wright performed their maiden flight Dec.17, 1903, at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
"While this celebration is taking place in the Air Force hangar with the Air Force variant of the F-35, this is really a story about the fully integrated team of Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, industry and community partners who have been working years to make this day possible," said Col. Andrew Toth, the 33rd Fighter Wing commander. "In fact, Marine Col. Art Tomassetti, my vice, (today's master of ceremonies), and test pilot, has been with this program for more than a decade. So, some of us have been waiting a long time to see this day."
During the past two years, the integrated and multi-service team "Nomads" transformed their corner of Eglin AFB into the Department of Defense's F-35 Integrated Training Center. The center includes a university setting in which maintainers are expected to live, work and train alongside pilots in operating the fifth-generation stealth fighter.
More than 400 guests watched the JSF unveiling inside a newly constructed Air Force hangar, a place where a future generation of F-35 maintainers, pilots and leaders will learn their craft.
"Eventually about 2,200 maintainers and 100 pilots a year will pass through our schoolhouse doors," Toth said. "In 2014, the program should mature enough to have the Air Force send students fresh from basic training."
Delivery and success of the new program required the Air Force overcome a great number of challenges. It will continue to do so until the F-35 capabilities reach their full potential for the interest of national security, Rice said.
"But with all the wonders of technology and the amazing physical performance of the F-35, let me say that none of this happens without magnificent people," he said.
Wing leadership said they're already reaping the benefits of multi-service collaboration in co-located facilities.
"What this aircraft behind me is a visual representation of our exciting future," Toth said. "The 33rd Pursuit Group of the past is nothing like the 33rd FW of today, except in the longstanding spirit of air power. With the F-35 program, we foresee air dominance for our services and partner nations for the next 30 to 50 years."
Saturn has responded to quickly to questions raised about the 117S engine after a flame-out on Sunday forced Sukhoi T50-2 test pilot Sergei Bogdan to execute a rather hasty take-off abort procedure. It didn't help that the starboard engine flame-out occurred in front of about 200,000 witnesses at the MAKS air show hoping to catch a glimpse of Russia's premier new stealth fighter.
The 117S is one of the key innovations supporting both the Su-35 and PAK-FA prototpye programmes. The new engine boosts thrust compared to the Saturn Al-31FP by 16% to 14,500kgf in maximum reheat for the SU-35BM, and perhaps even higher for the PAK-FA version. (Jane's also has reported that Russia has agreed to transfer the Saturn/UMPO 117 to AVIC for the J-20.) And it introduces a digital engine control system fully integrated with the T50 prototype's flight control system. It appears to be the latter feature that caused the engine breakdown, according to Flightglobal's Moscow-based correspondent Vladimir Karnozov, who writes today:
Speaking to Russian media two days after the incident, NPO Saturn general director Ilya Fedorov acknowledged that the starboard Item 117 "suffered surge".
According to Fedorov, this happened due to a malfunctioning multi-parameter sensor, at some point of time it began feeding "erroneous data" to the airplane's control system. He thanked Sukhoi test-pilot Sergei Bogdan for prompt reaction to the engine failure. "It was a test for the new machine. During flight trials on any brand-new aircraft - and this airplane is undergoing flight trials - malfunctions such as this one are not only possible, but even mandatory". Fedorov stated that flight trials are meant for finding and eliminating any would-be malfunctions "so that these do not happen after the new type becomes operational".
Fedorov further insisted that "the motor did not fail - in fact, it was put by erroneous control input into a wrong mode that caused surge... this is not an engine failure, but the wrong data input caused by a malfunctioning sensor feeding data to the flight control system". Saturn head further insisted that the T50-2 starboard engine "is intact". "After what had happened, the motor was checked with dedicated equipment, the malfunctioning sensor was replaced by a good one. Today, there is no issue with this engine".
Russia's Sukhoi T-50 5th generation fighter performed its first demonstration flight at the MAKS 2011 International Aviation and Space Show on Wednesday.
The flight was observed by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and other dignitaries.
Experts said the pilots had not performed any aerobatic stunts because the plane is still going through a series of test flights.
It was important for the manufacturers to show that "the plane no longer exists just on paper, but is fleshed out in metal and up in the air."
The T-50, developed under the program PAK FA (Future Aviation System for Tactical Air Force) at the Sukhoi OKB, will be the jewel in the Russian Air Force's crown. The service has relied on the Mikoyan MiG-29 and Sukhoi Su-27 family of combat aircraft as the core of its fighter force since the mid-1980s, but these aircraft are seen as approaching obsolescence.
The T-50 is Russia's first new major combat aircraft designed since the fall of the Soviet Union. When an operational fighter based on it is put into service, possibly as soon as 2015, it will be the Russian Air Force's first stealth aircraft, featuring low-observable technology that makes it almost impossible to detect with radar.
Like its U.S. counterpart, the F-22 Raptor, it will be able to cruise at supersonic speeds, and be capable of pulling high-G maneuvers that older aircraft cannot match thanks to thrust-vectoring exhaust nozzles and a hi-tech flight control system.
The T-50 made its first flight at the Komsomolsk-on-Amur factory airfield in Siberia in January, and since then two prototypes have been undergoing flight tests at the Zhukovsky flight test center near Moscow.
