Pilot training on the F-35 is about to get started:
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2011/ ... s-102811w/
Pilots await go-ahead for F-35 flight ops
By Dave Majumdar - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Oct 28, 2011 18:12:06 EDT
Pilots at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., are eagerly awaiting the go-ahead to fly their new F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighters.
There are currently four Air Force conventional takeoff F-35As at the seaside base that are being used for validating technical data for the aircraft, said Col. Andrew Toth, who commands of the 33rd Fighter Wing.
“That’s helping us do preparations in order to get us flying later this fall,” Toth said.
The base’s pilots are waiting for a military flight release to begin flight operations on their new mount.
“We expect that flight release to come no earlier than the end of October,” he said. The month ends on Monday.
Around the same time, in the latter half of November and early December, new Marine Corps F-35B short-takeoff, vertical-landing, or STOVL, jets will begin to arrive at the base, Toth said.
The Air Force leads a triservice command that will oversee aircraft and entire squadrons from the Navy and Marine Corps.
Currently, Eglin has two lead instructor pilots who are qualified to fly and teach in the F-35: Marine Maj. Joseph Bachmann and Air Force Lt. Col. Eric Smith. The two veteran test pilots recently completed a set of “maturity tests” at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., which mimicked the initial pilot syllabus at Eglin, in order to make sure the jets are ready for instructor pilots and students to begin training.
Once the pilots at Eglin receive their flight clearance, Smith and Bachmann will clear the rest of the unit’s instructor pilots, including Toth, to fly and instruct in the new jet.
The first class they will teach will be part of an operational utility evaluation, which will validate the training course, Toth said.
“It’s just to make sure our training system is in place, up and running, and can effectively produce pilots in a transition-type course,” he said.
Once the unit completes the evaluation course, Air Education and Training Command will declare the unit ready for training.
The initial class will consist of two pilots from the 33rd Fighter Wing and two operational test pilots who will go on to fly at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., with the Joint Operational Test Team. The start date is “event driven,” Toth said, but he expects the flying portion of the evaluation course to start in the “very, very early spring.”
The initial transition course, which will teach basic airmanship in the jet, will last 12 weeks: six weeks of academics followed by 120 hours of classes, 14 simulator flights and six real flights, Toth said.
“That’s what this first course is, it’s the fundamentals of the airplane and basic flying: take off, land, navigation, those sorts of things,” Toth said. “All of the advanced mission stuff comes as we grow and develop.”
One major change from previous types is that the academics are conducted electronically on laptoplike devices, said Marine Col. Arthur Tomassetti, vice commander of the 33rd Fighter Wing.
The pilots will initially have a limited flight envelope — 450 knots and 5 Gs — but that’s more than enough for the first group of aviators, Toth said.
“Even that 5 G limit is more than what we’d use on a given day,” he said.
Eglin’s F-35s will initially fly under visual flight rules; instrument flying will be introduced around the middle of next year. As more capabilities are released, the syllabus will be updated to accommodate new functions, Toth said.
Even the F-35B aircraft will operate in their conventional mode for now, deferring training for STOVL mode until the F-35B model receives its flight release for that regime, Tomassetti said.
“It should be pretty easy for us to just take those folks and cycle them through those training events that were deferred,” he said.
The focus right now is simply to build up a cadre of instructor pilots, Toth said. The training demand will grow rapidly in the near future.
Currently, the base has 35 pilots from three services who it must train to be F-35 instructor pilots, Tomassetti said. Already the Marines have about a dozen pilots at the base, he said. There about 17 Air Force pilots and six Navy pilots, Toth said.
For the Marine pilots transitioning from the AV-8B Harrier to the F-35B, the biggest change will be that instead of practicing takeoffs and landings, the majority of their time will be spent flying tactical training sorties, said Tomassetti, a veteran Harrier aviator and the original test pilot for the X-35B prototype. That would put the Marine STOVL force on the same footing as other tactical fighters.
But what will truly make the F-35 different from a macro perspective is that, as it becomes operational, the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps will have early opportunities to share expertise and concepts.
“The ability for our pilots to be in the squadron and have that cross-flow between the Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force is extremely important,” Toth said.
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