This week
fiightglobal.com 19-25 January 2016 | Flight International | 9
Pilots lack manual
flying skills: report
air transPort P1 3E
mbraer ended 2015 on a five-
year high, with full-year
deliveries across business and
commercial aviation hitting 221
aircraft. That total fell short of
2010’s 246 deliveries, but was an
improvement 208 in 2014.
In all, the Brazilian airframer
handed over 101 regional jets
during last year – one aircraft
above its guidance – and 120
business jets, including the first
examples of its superlight Legacy
450, which were handed over in
the final quarter.
During the three monthsended 31 December, it shipped
33 commercial jets – the majority
of which were E175s – and 45
corporate aircraft; the latter total
dominated by 23 Phenom 300
light jets.
Its firm order backlog stands at
$22.5 billion, having been liftedin the last quarter by orders for 19
more E175s from US carrier
SkyWest and the firming of two
options by KLM Cityhopper.
The orderbook now includes
only three examples of the E170,
the smallest EJet-family member,
all destined for Japan Airlines. ■preparations
Multinational school soars past 3,000 sorties at Luke aFBThe multinational pilot training centre
at Luke AFB in Arizona has grown ex-
ponentially since receiving its first
Lockheed Martin F-35 in March
2014, with the unit recently having
logged its 3,000th sortie.
As the world’s premier training
base for the conventional take-off
and landing F-35A, Luke is preparing
pilots and instructors for the US AirForce, Australia, Italy and Norway, with
Israel and Japan to soon join this list.
Other partners – the Netherlands,
Turkey and possibly Canada and
Denmark – will join the pooling ar-
rangement and share aircraft and
instructors.
56th Fighter Wing commander Brig
Gen Scott Pleus says the base
counts 34 pooled F-35As in USAF,Australian and Norwegian liveries.
“Throughout this year, I’ll get two
more Norwegian F-35s, our first two
Italian F-35s, and six more F-35s with
US flags on the tail,” says Pleus.
“We’ll be sitting somewhere around
44 jets by the end of 2016.”
Eventually, Luke will house 144
jets assigned to six training squad-
rons, and have 12 simulators. ■T
he issue of concurrency has
again struck the Lockheed
Martin F-35, after it was found air
in the fighter’s fuel tanks could
over-pressurise “beyond design
limits” in certain flight profiles.
Described as a “low-risk poten-
tial”, the flaw was identified dur-
ing lightning protection qualifica-
tion in late 2014, and
re-confirmed in follow-on tests
last year, the Joint Programme
Office (JPO) tells Flight
International. The issue, which
impacts all three F-35 variants
operated by the US services and
international buyers, led to “pre-
cautionary flight limits” being
imposed, it adds.
The concurrent development
and fielding of aircraft has been a
challenge for the F-35 programme
since its inception, with previous
discoveries having led to delays
and expensive fixes or worka-
rounds. Lockheed has delivered
154 aircraft, with a year of testing
remaining.
Last December, the programme
flight-tested new pressure relief
valves to enable it to remove the
latest flight restrictions. Modifica-
tion work will begin on 41 A-
model aircraft, under a $28.8 mil-
lion contract with Lockheed
announced on 12 January. This
also includes examples already
delivered to Australia, Italy, the
Netherlands and Norway.US Air Force F-35 integration
office director Maj Gen Jeffrey
Harrigian alerted Congress in writ-
ten testimony last October, saying
a decision would be taken in De-US Air Force
New relief valves will allow F-35A flight restrictions to be removedFive-year high for Embraer as deliveries stay strong
data
engineering jAmEs drEw WAShINGTON DC
F-35 schedule faces extra pressure
“Low-risk potential” of fuel tank over-pressurisation latest concurrency issue to affect fifth-generation fighter programme
cember on whether the “major”
over-pressurisation modification
could wait until the next modifi-
cation cycle, or require immediate
action. The latter could make it
difficult for the service to declare
initial operational capability with
the type in August at Hill AFB in
Utah, as planned.
The JPO says a contract modifi-
cation has been made to retrofit
short take-off and vertical landing
F-35Bs with relief valves, and
Lockheed is compiling an engi-
neering proposal to correct the
carrier-based F-35C. F-35As will
be modified using “concurrency
funding” in low-rate initial pro-
duction contracts. ■IN ASSOCIATION WITHKeep track of the latest developments in
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