September 14, 2015
The Marine Corps triumphantly declared its variant of the F-35 combat ready in late July
Unrealistic Tests
The aircraft were not cleared to carry any ordnance. This was hardly surprising, in part because the F-35B will not be able to fire its gun until 2019.
A relatively empty flight deck, without over 20 additional aircraft that make up the rest of the Air Combat Element (ACE).
The absence of key combat mission systems, since they were either not installed or not cleared for use.
For the software that was installed, DOT&E noted that degradations that would have to be addressed in combat “were often ignored during this event, as long as the aircraft were able to safely conduct the event’s limited training objectives.” This meant that in some instances, planes were flown when they were not fully combat ready.
Due to an unreliable logistics management system—named the Automatic Logistics Global Sustainment (ALGS) system—crew used “[n]on-operationally representative [supply system] workarounds” to support the program, including for basic tasks such as fueling.
Poor Test Results
The F-35Bs used for the demonstration were never able to achieve the planned number of flight hours over the 10 days of flight operations due to various maintenance issues.
The Marine Corps triumphantly declared its variant of the F-35 combat ready in late July
Unrealistic Tests
The aircraft were not cleared to carry any ordnance. This was hardly surprising, in part because the F-35B will not be able to fire its gun until 2019.
A relatively empty flight deck, without over 20 additional aircraft that make up the rest of the Air Combat Element (ACE).
The absence of key combat mission systems, since they were either not installed or not cleared for use.
For the software that was installed, DOT&E noted that degradations that would have to be addressed in combat “were often ignored during this event, as long as the aircraft were able to safely conduct the event’s limited training objectives.” This meant that in some instances, planes were flown when they were not fully combat ready.
Due to an unreliable logistics management system—named the Automatic Logistics Global Sustainment (ALGS) system—crew used “[n]on-operationally representative [supply system] workarounds” to support the program, including for basic tasks such as fueling.
Poor Test Results
The F-35Bs used for the demonstration were never able to achieve the planned number of flight hours over the 10 days of flight operations due to various maintenance issues.
Comment