allardjd 1,853 Posted October 15, 2018 Report Share Posted October 15, 2018 10 Percent of Critical F-22 Fleet Reportedly Damaged or Destroyed by Hurricane Michael https://pjmedia.com/trending/10-percent-of-critical-f-22-fleet-reportedly-damaged-or-destroyed-by-hurricane-michael/ Illustrating once again that capping production at about 190 airframes was short-sighted. As I understand it, all that were flyable were flown out and those remaining could not be flown for some technical (or administrative) reason. I don't claim to know how the AF manages this kind of thing and this observation is, of course, made with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight. I'll just say this - it seems as if, in circumstances like this, some kind of administrative process should permit limited ferry flights of high-value AC that are not necessarily fully functional, with appropriate restrictions on speed, altitude, power settings, g-loadings, pressurization, take-off weight, routing, etc. etc. when faced with this kind of environmental threat. Maybe this exists already and possibly these airframes had such serious problems that they simply could not be flown under any circumstances - I really don't know one way or the other. There are some environmental challenges to hardware that just can't be guarded against - tornadoes, for instance. This particular storm was a fast-mover and the area only had about three days of credible warnings to protect their assets, vice the normal seven or so. That may have been a factor. I suppose it's also possible that they had judged the hangar(s) to be storm-proof. If so, that turned out to be wrong. I think all of the F-22s affected were stored inside hangars, but some of the buildings I saw photos of were, though not collapsed, at least heavily damaged and opened up to the environment. Anyway, a disaster for the fleet of F-22s. I suspect some heads will roll. John Link to post Share on other sites
dodgy-alan 1,587 Posted October 15, 2018 Report Share Posted October 15, 2018 Oops, someones in the shit! Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted October 16, 2018 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2018 Maybe some good news here... or maybe just spin. Repairs to these things are also very expensive, but given where we are probably worth it to keep the damaged AC in the inventory. There aren't all that many of them that giving up on a couple dozen is a good option. https://twitchy.com/gregp-3534/2018/10/16/update-on-the-damaged-f-22-stealth-fighters-at-tyndall-air-force-base/ From the one video I've seen it appears that a lot of the damage came from impact by flying or falling foreign objects when the hangar(s) became open to the WX. For stealthy aircraft, dings and dents are a big deal. I still think someone screwed the pooch on this. I suspect that some of these AC could have been safely flown to other bases with suitable flight restrictions, but maybe not. Just speculation on my part. John Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,498 Posted October 16, 2018 Report Share Posted October 16, 2018 Well that's better news for the free world. Link to post Share on other sites
Tristarcaptain 282 Posted October 16, 2018 Report Share Posted October 16, 2018 Time to get out the crazy glue and automotive spray cans.....that should do the job! When I bought Airfix kits, they had a skill rating to what experience was required to build the kit. I am wondering what the skill level of this particular job would be.....!!! Martin P.S. Yeap.....they should have built more F-22's in the first place!! I just hope that the Russians don't hack into this site and take advantage of the fact that USAF is down on their F-22 numbers!! Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted October 16, 2018 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2018 9 minutes ago, Tristarcaptain said: Yeap.....they should have built more F-22's in the first place!! Amen! John Link to post Share on other sites
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