Fighter Pilots Claim Intimidation Over F-22 Raptor Jets

And just so what??? about the oxygen problem. It's just a technical snag whose solution will add a hundred million to the price of each unit.

That's a small price to pay for being provided the piece of mind of having the most profitable Military Defense Industry in this part of the galaxy.

but don't forget another country working pretty hard on the military industrial complex.



Now that the Russians are out the "defense" industry needs a new competitor and the Chinese are more than happy to play ball.

with the Marines and the Osprey? I seem to recall a lot of pilots and crew members worried about poor air performance and lots of safety concerns.

If you dont work in a dangerous job, feel lucky. My trade of ironworking is the most dangerous trade in construction. Like, coal mining is more dangerous. Maybe(these days) drilling is up there too.

Someone in the acquisition process or command responsible for these fighters may have been hoping for year this problem would never surface. Somebody has made false statements somewhere, or embellished reports or something. That is the chief mechanism behind trying to intimidate a whistleblower - because YOU will be busted if they arent shut up.

In DU there is a lot of hot air, people say this, bitch and moan about that, criticize the other thing. Few actually DO anything. I can empathize with these pilots. I called bullshit on some members of the volunteer mountain rescue team here in colo springs. They very arguably endangered members of the public during a mission response. Boy did they have a sad attack that I was daring to "attack" the "structure" of the team. What that really means is how dare you suggest Im not perfect, or at least better than you and now my injured ego will respond with fury and outrage. And slander. They slandered me right off the team(obviously Im a PTSD case, right?) via personnel in the county sheriffs office.

Its the community I was helping that loses. My garden this year is spectaular.

Back up these pilots. Honor their integrity and courage willing to sacrifice a nice comfy career and retirement because a) they dont want to die and b) they dont want anybody else to die and think "I should have said something". They are doing the right thing.

Follow suit. Stop speaking in euphemisms and hedging everything you say (ie, "I'd almost want to do it the right way"). Speak plainly, Choose effective words and the right words.Stop using over the top rhetoric. And give up your ego. There are a million ways to do anything and get to the same point. If you lose the ego, you arent worried about hearing something you dont like.

Thanks for the thread, maddezmom.

Sorry sir, I crashed your plane because I let that little breathing/living thing get in the way of piloting.

WTOP news radio in DC is essentially corporate spokesman radio in the DC area. Great traffic and weather reporting, but when it comes to news they always throw a little spin on it.

They mentioned that pilots were saying the F-22 had some kind of orientation problem and pilots were refusing to fly it. They went on to ask why pilots are refusing to fly our newest and most capable fighter jet.

Hmmmmm, most capable.

That would imply it's pilot error and not a major fault with the actual aircraft. In fact, we can't even get this aircraft into actual use which clearly indicates it is not the most capable fighter jet we have. It's still a test plane with millions upon millions sunk into it and it's not of much more use than a paper weight at this point.

To call it capable is a distortion at best.

It's got problems, but that's not why it's unused in combat - it's because there's no mission for it. Were we in a shooting war against anyone with modern fighter planes the F-22 would be used without hesitation and, I'm confident, to great effect. (Just because a plane is not as safe as it should be for peacetime flying doesn't mean it's not effective in combat!)

But the wars we're fighting now don't demand air-to-air combat, and nothing would be more wasteful than trying to use an F-22 in a ground attack role. So our pilots fly it to gain and maintain proficiency and send a message that we're willing to sink more money into defense than we really need to.

It may not be used for it's described purpose, but if this plane were ready for use it would damn well be used if for no other reason than to "justify" all the money spent on it.

Whatever else they may be, the Air Force is not stupid. The only weapon mounted on an F-22 remotely capable of hitting ground targets is its gun, and the last thing you want to do with an expensive piece of dedicated air-to-air weaponry is expose it to the chance of a lucky hit attacking a low-value target much better dealt with using drones or dedicated attack aircraft.

I'd bet not a single pilot raising these very valid safety concerns would voluntarily enter air-to-air combat flying anything else, were there a shooting war going on. The plane actually is "in use" - it's deployed with operational squadrons.

By parallel logic, no nuclear weapon in the world since 1945 is "capable."

and it's covered with ads. The MSMedia lacks credibility as it is and the ABC site seems the same.

I tried for the longest time to exit off their site and my computer wouldn't let me.

chose what you want to track you

Seriously, I have been using Ghostery for quite a while now and it is a good program.

You can see what's been blocked by hovering the mouse pointer over the Ghostery icon in the taskbar. The list can be extensive on many sites.

Battle of the X-Planes: Nova
20022hrNR

NOVA follows the battles and backroom deal-making between Lockheed and Boeing in their race to win the largest defense contract ever, worth $1 trillion. Follow four years of decision-making regarding test flights, aviation engineering and contract negotiations that resulted in the Joint Strike Fighter -- a plane made to be adaptable, affordable and stealthy.

JSF is the F-35. The plane with the oxygen problem is the F-22 Raptor, which one a previous competition against the YF-23.

The F-35 is supposed to be the "affordable" complement to the F-22, with a strike role (the F-22 is dedicated to air-to-air combat).

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2012/05/air-force-f22-maintainers-illness-050712/

Oxygen problems plaguing the Air Force’s F-22 stealth fighter are afflicting maintainers working on the plane — as well as pilots — with dizziness, nausea and other hypoxia-like symptoms, Air Force Times has learned.

At least five ground maintainers complained of illness between September and December, Air Combat Command spokesman Lt. Col. Tadd Sholtis said in an Air Force Times article that hit the newsstands Monday. The maintainers grew sick after breathing in ambient air during ground engine runs, a congressional aide told Air Force Times.