High costs, malfunctions plague F-22 Raptor fighter jets

[n2doc]

By W.J. Hennigan, Los Angeles Times
August 6, 2011, 7:47 p.m.
It's the most expensive fighter jet ever built. Yet the F-22 Raptor has never seen a day of combat, and its future is clouded by a government safety investigation that has grounded the jet for months.

The fleet of 158 F-22s has been sidelined since May 3, after more than a dozen incidents in which oxygen was cut off to pilots, making them woozy. The malfunction is suspected of contributing to at least one fatal accident.

At an estimated cost of $412 million each, the F-22s amount to about $65 billion sitting on the tarmac. The grounding is the latest dark chapter for an aircraft plagued by problems, and whose need was called into question even before its first test flight.

The sleek, diamond-winged fighter was conceived during the Cold War in the early 1980s to thump a new generation of Soviet fighter jets in dogfights. But with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Soviet fighters that the U.S. military planners feared never moved beyond development and were never built.


http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fighter-jets-grounded-20110807,0,5483241.story

I feel so safe and secure!

[Poll_Blind]

1. The oxygen wasn't just cut off, they were found with propane, anti-freeze, etc. in blood stream!

More at the Air Force Times. The Air Force Times.

PB

[PDittie]

2. Lockheed is the absolute worst corporate welfare recipient

in the nation, maybe in the world. If you think this F-22 is a clusterfuck, Google 'F-35 joint strike fighter'. Both former Sec. Gates and John McCain have been stunned by the cost overruns and have said publicly that the program ought to be cancelled. But like the F-22 and the V-22 and all the other boondoggles, it won't be.

[n2doc]

3. kick n/t