Thu, Mar 01, 2007
Navigation Systems Bug Affects 87 Fighters
Lockheed Martin says it is making progress in fixing an
electrical glitch that caused some tense moments for pilots
ferrying six F-22 Raptor fighters from Hawaii to Japan earlier this
month.
The Associated Press reports the glitch -- which popped up as
the jets crossed the International Date Line -- affects
navigational computers on approximately 87 F-22s. A senior Air
Force officer said such anomalies are common during initial
deployments of new aircraft.
"Until you really fly the airplane and do something that's when
the rubber hits the road. Industry are developing any kind of
computer or airplane system, and you will see there is no
substitute for flying something," said Colonel Tom Bergeson,
Operations Group Commander at the First Fighter Wing at Virginia's
Langley Air Force Base.
ANN received several News-Spy reports the glitch caused some
concern on the test flight. Loss of the navigational computers came
as the jets crossed the Pacific Ocean -- an area without many handy
waypoints, for the suddenly-VFR aircraft.
The Air Force states one pilot was able to contact Lockheed
Martin, to troubleshoot the problem inflight. The other five pilots
attempted to reboot the system on their planes, with no success.
Fortunately, the aircraft were able to turn back to Hawaii, aided
by the aerial tankers accompanying the fighters to Japan.
Lockheed engineers were able to isolate the problem on those six
fighters, and develop a fix within days, the USAF added. Lockheed
is now working to remedy the problem on the rest of the affected
planes; as Aero-News reported, the
Raptors made it to Okinawa's Kadena AFB without further
incident.
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