OBIGGS problem grounds local jets

The 56th Fighter Wing at Luke Air Force Base, Arizona, has cancelled local flying operations for its F-35A Lightning II fighters after five incidents in which pilots experienced symptoms similar to hypoxia, or oxygen deprivation.

In a release Friday, the Air Force said that the five pilots reported those incidents over the last month, since May 2. The backup oxygen systems in the F-35As kicked in during each incident, and the pilots followed the procedures necessary to safely land the plane.

“In order to synchronize operations and maintenance efforts toward safe flying operations, we have cancelled local F-35A flying,” Brig. Gen. Brook Leonard, commander of the 56th, said in the release. “The Air Force takes these physiological incidents seriously, and our focus is on the safety and well-being of our pilots. We are taking the necessary steps to find the root cause of these incidents.”

More at the Jump

https://www.airforcetimes.com/articles/f-35s-at-luke-air-force-base-grounded-after-pilots-suffered-oxygen-deprivation

Never let it be said that I only report the good news.

From the same source.. The F-22’s OBIGGS problem was a valve on the vest and not the OBIGGS itself.

The F-22 Raptor also struggled with oxygen problems that led to hypoxia in its pilots, leading the Air Force to ground the planes for five months in 2011. The Air Force in July 2012 said that the F-22’s hypoxia problems were caused by a faulty valve on the pilots’ life support vest, which was improperly tightening and constricting their breathing.

It’s a “capability upgrade” because it’s better than what they currently have.

does not have to use afterburner as often

Why?

It has a large percentage of dry thrust and the program has already stated that the F-35 will not need to use the AB on takeoff as often. The engine is one reason and another is that it’s basic combat mission is flying clean (no tanks or EFTs that induce a lot of drag. Other anecdotal evidence of chase planes having to use AB to keep up with F-35s that are not using AB is an item that supports this.

@TangoIII

Despite its price tag, officials prefer the F-35 Lightning II to the alternative of more Eurofighters.

Spain’s Air Force and Navy have sights set on new American fighter aircraft

Replying here to keep the “News” thread clean.

@TangoIII, the F-35A is a lot cheaper than the Eurofighter especially to upgrade. Price on the B is likely closer to the Eurofighter but as the article states, they don’t have that option.

whenever you or Spud are quoting LRIP cost, you never include these additional contracts worth billions.

I don’t include them because:
— They have nothing to do with the annual production efficiency calculations, you know, the point of comparing one year’s cost vs previous year’s.
— They are impossible to assign to any particular lot and differ even in the same production year.
— They literally belong to a different portion of the budget than Procurement.
— They are already known and have been talked about to death.
— The monies included in the contracts were actually set aside in multiple previous years and was spent in one contract.

nobody cares where it belongs.

Considering that Giovanni de Briganti was claiming that these costs were part of Lot 9 and then using that over-inflated Lot 9 cost to claim that the JPO was lying about the price coming down, I think anyone who actually wants to know the truth will care where the numbers actually go.

paying true billions under hidden separate contracts which can’t be attributed to a particular lot..

If you open up a budget doc it will tell you specifically what year is paying for what items. Add to that there are available graphs to show you what lots are costing for “concurrently” items.

That site is a major PITA.

You can’t even click “back” when looking at a contract to get back to the results and must redo a search, each and every time.

Btw, from what I have seen so far the items do not describe what is covered or where the money is coming from.

All you need to do is download the results as a CSV and add up the total (column 10)… $6.8billion (which includes spares). Doing the same search for the engine contract for Lot9 (N0001914C0004) comes up with $1.5 billion.

Huh. That seems to be a lot less than DA’s total of $11,896,179,273.

Kind of blows the DA “analysis” of skyrocketing costs out of the water and it only took me 5 minutes.

Here are the direct searches

Airframe (N0001914C0002)
https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.4.4&s=FPDSNG.COM&q=N0001914C0002&x=0&y=0
Downlaod as CSV https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?s=FPDSNG.COM&indexName=awardfull&templateName=CSV&q=N0001914C0002&renderer=jsp&length=68

Engine (N0001914C0004)
https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.4.4&s=FPDSNG.COM&q=N0001914C0004&x=0&y=0
Downlaod as CSV https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?s=FPDSNG.COM&indexName=awardfull&templateName=CSV&q=N0001914C0004&renderer=jsp&length=68

These F135 updates might be a perfect way for the B-21 to be powered, certainly the most cost effective.

The reduced fuel burn saving alone would easily pay for the R&D. Remember that this is actual hardware & performance and not “estimated” savings.