First Lockheed Martin Mission Systems-Equipped Airplane Begins Flight Tests

The first F-35 Lightning II stealth fighter with a full avionics suite made its first flight Thursday, ushering in what will be the most powerful and comprehensive sensor package ever to fly in a fighter.

During the flight, F-35 Test Pilot David Nelson climbed to 15,500 feet, verified engine response at varying throttle settings, performed a series of flight-qualities maneuvers and checked the operation of the aircraft's mission systems. The flight out of Lockheed Martin's Fort Worth plant began at 1004 CDT and concluded at 1059.

"Today's flight initiates a level of avionics capability that no fighter has ever achieved," said Eric Branyan, Lockheed Martin F-35 deputy program manager. "The F-35's next-generation sensor suite enables a new capability for multi role aircraft, collecting vast amounts of data and fusing the information into a single, highly comprehensible display that will enable the pilot to make faster and more effective tactical decisions."

The F-35's avionics, or mission systems, also process and apply data from a wide array of off-board sensors based on land, in the air or at sea, enabling the jet to perform command-and-control functions while providing unprecedented situational awareness to air and surface forces.

The F-35 BF-4, a short takeoff/vertical landing (STOVL) variant, will begin testing with the AESA radar, EW, ICNI, ICP, GPS, INS and HMDS, then integrate the remaining sensors as flight testing progresses. F-35C carrier variant and F-35A conventional takeoff and landing variant test aircraft will be similarly mission systems-equipped, with mission systems commonality among the three variants near 100 percent. High avionics commonality is an enabler of rapid training, interoperability, and lower production and support costs.

F-35 avionics already have undergone more than 100,000 hours of laboratory testing, including sensor-fusion testing in the program's Cooperative Avionics Test Bed, a highly modified 737 airliner incorporating the entire F-35 mission systems suite, including an F-35 cockpit. F-35 software has demonstrated remarkable stability, and sensors have met or exceeded performance predictions.

BF-4 is scheduled to fly to Naval Air Station Patuxent River, MD, where it will join three other F-35Bs currently undergoing flight testing. BF-4's general test objectives include providing data for mission systems Block 0.5 functionality in the F-35 flight environment to evaluate hardware and software implementation and integration, and providing data to support mission systems component development.

The Block 0.5 software incorporates important capabilities, including air-to-air search and synthetic aperture radar modes, identification friend/foe transponder, integrated UHF/VHF radios, electronic warfare radar warning receiver, and navigation functions. Information is presented to the pilot through state-of-the-art cockpit and helmet displays.

FMI: www.dod.gov