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| Boeing |
Pat Host, Washington, DC - Jane's Defence Weekly
04 January 2019
Key Points
- The USAF will expand its vertical fight training now that it has Boeing under contract to deliver the T-X trainer
- The service performed its first sortie after awarding Boeing the contract
The
US Air Force (USAF) will expand its vertical fight training now that it has
Boeing under contract to deliver its T-X advanced pilot training programme,
according to a key officer.
Major
General Patrick Doherty, 19th Air Force commander, on 27 November flew the
USAF's first official sortie in a T-X aircraft. The service awarded Boeing its
contract in late September to build the aircraft that will eventually replace
its fleet of Northrop T-38C Talon trainers.
David
Deptula, dean of the Air Force Association's (AFA's) Mitchell Institute and a
retired fighter pilot and USAF commander, told Jane's on 4 January that vertical fight
training is the ability of a pilot to perform basic fighter manoeuvres. While
the T-38C can perform these basic fighter manoeuvres, it is limited because it
has such a small wing with huge turn ratios. He said the T-38C, at altitude,
tends to lose airspeed very quickly in high speed turns.
"[The
T-38C is a high-performing aircraft, but in the context of fighter aviation
capability and skills that are necessary to be learned to succeed in fighter
manoeuvres, the T-X might be a better performing aircraft," Deptula said.
Maj
Gen Doherty told Jane's on 18 December that the aircraft,
flown in St Louis, Missouri, had a great thrust-to-weight ratio and that the
T-X felt similar to a combination of a mini-Boeing F/A-18 Hornet and a
mini-Lockheed Martin F-16V Viper.
"I
thought it met all my expectations of what we were looking for as an air force
and Air Education and Training Command for a fifth-generation platform for the
future," Maj Gen Doherty said.
Source: www.janes.com
Source: www.janes.com
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