The US Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) spent most of Thursday (Washington time) grilling Pentagon officials on the faltering JSF program as it hurtles towards a probable Nunn-McCurdy cost breach in April, which will likely result in all expenditure being frozen while the program is substantially restructured. Of key interest to SASC members was the
EADS has confirmed it won’t go it alone in bidding for the USAF’s KC-X tanker replacement after partner Northrop Grumman’s decision not to bid for the program, effectively making the process a one-horse race for Boeing’s 767 based ‘NewGen Tanker’. EADS CEO Louis Gallois told European media on March 10 that he doesn’t “see any
The first A400M prototype, MSN1, has arrived in Toulouse for further flight testing after being ferried from Seville in Spain. The ferry flight was the 10th for the aircraft since its first flight on December 11, and it has completed 39 flight test hours to date. During initial testing, MSN1 has achieved its maximum operating
Hawker Beechcraft has delivered the 500th Beechcraft T-6 military trainer to the US military, a T-6B for the US Navy which will be based at NAS Whiting Field in Florida. The T-6 is based on the Pilatus PC-9 and was selected for the US Joint Primary Aircraft Training System (JPATS) role in 1996, with deliveries commencing
A report by the Rand Corporation says if an order for 75 new build F-22s were placed by the USAF after the current production run winds down, the aircraft would cost US$227m (A$248m) each after taking into account production re-start costs. The report, entitled Ending F-22A Production: Costs and Industrial Base Implications of Alternative Options
The USAF has awarded Boeing a US$69.7m (A$76m) contract for the initial engineering, manufacturing and development of QF-16 full scale aerial targets. The USAF requirement calls for up to 126 F-16s to be converted to QF-16 drones, with the aircraft being drawn from retired F-16A stocks. The first QF-16 is due to enter service from
