F-35 crash Albuquerque

[Zaphod58]

An F-35 departing Kirtland AFB in Albuquerque has crashed just outside the Albuquerque Sun Port. The pilot successfully ejected and was transported to the hospital. They were reported to be conscious during transport.

More as available.

[pianopraze]

A lot of these have crashed. 

I remember during evaluation/testing there was skuttlebut of how dangerous they were to fly.

[Zaphod58]

A lot of these have crashed. 

I remember during evaluation/testing there was skuttlebut of how dangerous they were to fly.

No, they really haven't.  This is something like 15 crashed, and MAYBE 40 mishaps (counting the 15 crashes in that). They've surpassed 800,000 flight hours since they started flying, and Luke AFB alone has flown over 100,000 sorties.

[VulcanWerks]

Thanks for providing scale, Zaphod.

[Zaphod58]

Lockheed has confirmed it was an F-35B that departed from Fort Worth, and stopped at Kirtland for fuel, while traveling from the factory to Edwards AFB.  It was flown by a DCMA pilot.

[pianopraze]

No, they really haven't.  This is something like 15 crashed, and MAYBE 40 mishaps (counting the 15 crashes in that). They've surpassed 800,000 flight hours since they started flying, and Luke AFB alone has flown over 100,000 sorties.

The US Air Force Quietly Admits the F-35 Is a Failure
The F-35 was explicitly intended to be a flexible, effective, and relatively affordable aircraft. Engineers designed its sophisticated logistics management systems to reduce downtime and boost reliability. Instead, it's become a trillion-dollar boondoggle.To say the F-35 has failed to deliver on its goals would be an understatement. Its mission capable rate is 69 percent(Opens in a new window), below the 80 percent benchmark set by the military. Just 36 percent of the F-35 fleet is available for dispatch, well below the required 50 percent standard. Problems include faster-than-expected engine wear, transparency delamination of the cockpit, and unspecified issues with the F-35's power module. Former Air Force pilots have not been kind(Opens in a new window) in their recent evaluations of the aircraft's performance and capabilities.

"Several factors contributed to these parts shortages, including F-35 parts breaking more often than expected, and DOD’s limited capability to repair parts when they break.

The F-35: A Mystery, Inside an Enigma, Wrapped Up in a Shit Show
 At this point, it's obvious that the F-35 is a problem child. There have been so many problems with the aircraft, it's difficult even to summarize them. Pilot blackouts, premature part failures, software development disasters, and more have all figured in various documents over the years. Firing the main gun can crack the plane. The Air Force has already moved to buy new F-15EX aircraft. Multiple partner nations that once promised F-35 buys have shifted orders to other planes.

Link

When US Navy and Marine F-35 pilots most need performance, the aircraft becomes erratic

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy’s and Marine Corps’ F-35s become unpredictable to handle when executing the kind of extreme maneuvers a pilot would use in a dogfight or while avoiding a missile, according to documents

Pilots reported the aircraft experiencing unpredictable changes in pitch, as well as erratic yaw and rolling motions. The documents identify the issue as a category 1 deficiency and define it as something that limits the aircraft’s performance in such a way that it can’t accomplish its “primary or alternate mission(s).” In this scale, category 1 represents the most serious type of deficiency.

Link

Report: F-35 Struggled With Reliability, Maintainability, Availability in 2023
 
The U.S. fleet of F-35 fighters continued to be vexed by reliability, maintainability, and availability (RMA) problems last fiscal year, available for operations only 51 percent of the time—compared to a goal of 65 percent—according to the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation’s annual report.
 
“The operational suitability of the F-35 fleet remains below service expectations and requirements,”

Link

EXCLUSIVE: I'm a former defense official who warned about F-35 safety and security problems years ago - this is why it may have been HACKED or malfunctioned

• A former Marine and watchdog revealed the F-35 is riddled with vulnerabilities
  
•  These vulnerabilities could let hackers brick fleets and take over weapons
  
• The Marine said the missing F-35 likely malfunctioned - but a further investigation will need to be conducted before confirming
  

 
A former US defense official who has warned about F-35 safety issues for years said a software glitch or cyberattack could have caused the missing jet to malfunction over South Carolina this weekend.
Former Marine Dan Grazier, who works at a Defense watchdog, authored a report in 2019 warning that the Department of Defenses' most expensive weapon system is plagued with cybersecurity vulnerabilities. 
He told DailyMail.com today: 'There are thousands of penetration points, weaknesses in the entire enterprise that a hacker could access the software.'
Grazier also claimed that the Pentagon has been aware of the software flaws since the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) office conducted testing in 2017 but has yet to rectify the problems.
The same DOT&E investigation showed a 26 percent fully missional capable rate across the entire F-35 fleet, which may have impacted Sunday's incident.
The $145 million jet went missing for hours over South Carolina when the pilot ejected during a training exercise and was found 28 hours later.

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I can only go on what I heard and read. I can not quote air hours and logged accidents. Those stats sound very good.

However, I heard from the early days, pilots were afraid of this plane.  I’ve read about a myriad of issues. Above is a small sample but I’ve read many, many more.

I’m glad acknowledge you know more but you statement of fact above belies this is a plane that has, from its beginning until today, had serious flaws.

yes I’ve read glowing articles too, but in the back of my mind is pilots afraid of this aircraft.

[Zaphod58]

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I can only go on what I heard and read. I can not quote air hours and logged accidents. Those stats sound very good.

However, I heard from the early days, pilots were afraid of this plane.  I’ve read about a myriad of issues. Above is a small sample but I’ve read many, many more.

I’m glad acknowledge you know more but you statement of fact above belies this is a plane that has, from its beginning until today, had serious flaws.

yes I’ve read glowing articles too, but in the back of my mind is pilots afraid of this aircraft.

Your first link is utter bullshit.  The Air Force admitted no such thing.  What they ACTUALLY said is that they were looking at another aircraft type to do some missions, because, as General Brown said, "You don't drive your Ferrari every day to go to the supermarket".  The Air Force doesn't need to use F-35s to bomb a bunch of Toyota trucks driving the the desert, with zero air defense.  That's what F-15s and F-16s are for.

As for the mission capable rates, they are on par with just about everything else in the Air Force inventory.  The F-35 couldn't legally set up a supply chain and depot system until Milestone C was declared, which happened in January. That means that they were ordering small batches of parts as needed, and setting up small local supply chains.  This means that the repair process has fallen significantly behind, because they're waiting on parts and the supply chain to be set up.  Give it a couple of years to build the supply chain and get the parts supply set up, and the mission capable rates will continue to go up.  In February, the mission capable rate was over 64%.  In FY21, the mission capable rate for the year was 68.80%.  The majority of the fighter fleet was between 60-70%.  There were six aircraft in the USAF that were over 80% for the year.

The second article is five years old.  A lot has changed since then, including a software update.  There's another software update being tested right now with yet another around the corner, bringing the aircraft to Block 4.

The third article again comes back to lack of supply chain, and old data.  The data was reported in September of 2023, using numbers from March.  By Feb, approximately a year after those numbers were compiled, the mission capable rate was back up to over 60% for the fleet, and has since passed 64%.  Most of the metrics required are being surpassed by the aircraft. 

The last link is a guy that works for Project On Government Oversight.  POGO is the biggest joke in the industry, and will inflate minor things into serious issues.  Dan Grazier was a Marine Corps tank crewmember when he was active duty.  How exactly does a tank guy know cybersecurity stuff for an aircraft that he never worked on? That's like an auto mechanic telling you that your rocket isn't going to fly because a computer gave a bad reading for half a second.

Pilots were never afraid of the F-35.  They WERE afraid of the F-22 and some other aircraft, but the F-35 has never had the serious problems that they had with the oxygen system.

[pianopraze]

 

That’s a small fraction of the articles I’ve been reading year after year after year.

Glad you know more than everyone writing articles. But I will just disagree with you. It’s been a problem for years.

Hope they have finally got the plane in good shape for all our sakes. I’ll take you’re word that things are better. I am not a fan of these drones they are pushing. I much prefer a human in the cockpit. 

I will agree about the fear from the f-22 oxygen and the marine twin rotor deathrap being worse.

There definitely are planes with a lot more problems.

[Zaphod58]

 

That’s a small fraction of the articles I’ve been reading year after year after year.

Glad you know more than everyone writing articles. But I will just disagree with you. It’s been a problem for years.

Hope they have finally got the plane in good shape for all our sakes. I’ll take you’re word that things are better. I am not a fan of these drones they are pushing. I much prefer a human in the cockpit. 

I will agree about the fear from the f-22 oxygen and the marine twin rotor deathrap being worse.

There definitely are planes with a lot more problems.

Just because someone writes an article that makes them an expert on what they're writing about? You're kidding right?  You don't have to know shit about what you're writing about, and it shows every time someone writes an article about aviation.  But you keep believing people that have never been on a flightline, let alone near a plane except occasionally as a passenger, because they write articles, so obviously they're experts.

[Zaphod58]

The aircraft was an TR2 aircraft, that was accepted last September. It went back into the factory to have test instrumentation installed, and was being flown by an Air Force pilot working for the DCMA. He was offered a quick climb, but told them he promised guys on the ramp he'd do a short take off.  Based on the pictures, there was a close to 90 degree crosswind on take off.  This marks the tenth crash of an F-35, and the 13th hull loss, although one aircraft that was written off is being taken apart and combined with another damaged aircraft to create a complete aircraft.