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launch and recovery with external stores
such as GBU-12 laser-guided bombs and
AIM-9X Sidewinders. This included
approach handling qualities with symmetric
and asymmetric external stores, so-called
Delta Flight Path testing, Joint Precision
Approach and Landing System testing,
crosswind and maximum-weight launches.Into service
The US Navy has been rather more tentative
with its service entry strategy than the US
Air Force and Marine Corps. F-35C callsign
‘Gunfighter 11’ touched down at Eglin Air
Force Base, Florida, on June 22, 2013, as
Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 101 ‘Grim
Reapers’ took its first steps as the initial Fleet
Replacement Squadron (FRS). The first
mission by a VFA-101 F-35C was flown from
Eglin on August 14 after the commander, Naval
Air Force Pacific VADM David Buss granted
the squadron Interim Safe for Flight status.
The unit began training the initial cadre of
instructor pilots, and it also started drawing
up the syllabus for carrier qualifi cations
(CQs), which was then tested by the
squadron during the fi nal phases of DT-III.
VFA-101 began ‘bouncing’ – fl ying FCLPs –
at NAS Meridian, Mississippi, in the weeks
preceding the carrier embarkation.Four squadron F-35Cs then embarked the
USS George Washington on August 14,
directly from Eglin, to begin the fi rst fl eet pilot
CQs. Of the 15 pilots on squadron strength, a
total of 12 deployed to the carrier. LT Graham
Cleveland, lead LSO at the ‘Grim Reapers’,
said: “It’s awesome to see that everybody
performs so well. We are on the boat less than
24 hours and almost everybody is qualifi ed
without a single ‘bolter’ [when the tailhook
misses all of the arresting wires]. We’ve not
heard any screaming calls from the LSOs and
not a single pilot has caught the one-wire,
which is less safe than a two- or the preferred
three-wire. We also haven’t seen any wave-
offs due to unsafe approaches.”
New F-35 technology had a large part to play.
The Delta Flight Path (DFP) has been
developed by the US Navy in close
co-operation with Lockheed Martin. It partly
automates the precise fl ying phase in the fi nal
seconds before touchdown. Without DFP, an
average pilot makes 200 to 300 minor
corrections with the throttle, stick and rudder
in the last 18 seconds before touchdown. DFP,
along with the Magic Carpet software
developed simultaneously for the F/A-18
Hornet, dramatically decreases these
corrections to just 20 for an average pilot. It is
expected that this number could even
drop below ten inputs!ABOVE: CF-05 with a full external load
of GBU-12s and AIM-9X during testing.
Lockheed Martin RIGHT: LCDR Chris Tabert
prepares to launch for one of the last
SDD ights on March 19, 2018, with a
full external load of Joint Direct Attack
Munitions (JDAMs). US Navy/Arnel Parker
LEF T: F-35C CF-03 engaged in catapult
launch testing at Joint Base McGuire-
Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey, in August
- Lockheed Martin ABOVE LEFT: CF-03
is prepared for the rst steam ingestion
catapult launch, on September 26, 2011.
Lockheed Martin
ABOVE: CF-01 transits the inshore test area
near NAS Patuxent River, Maryland, after
supersonic utter testing. Lockheed Martin
RIGHT: F-35C CF-03 bangs down on the
USS ‘Nimitz’ (CVN 68) during the DT-I trials.
Lockheed Martin/Andy Wolfe