Raptor Trips Over International Date Line
http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2590456&C=airwar
By BRUCE ROLFSEN
If the F-22A Raptor were a clock instead of a $330 million stealth
fighter, the U.S. Air Force might think about asking for its money
back.
It takes about 1.7 million lines of computer code to run the F-22A's
avionics, according to the Air Force. It turns out none of them deal
with what happens when the jet suddenly changes dates and time zones by
crossing the 180th meridian in the Pacific Ocean, the international
date line.
On Feb. 11, when a dozen Raptors en route from Hawaii to Japan crossed
the international date line for the first time, the jets' Global
Positioning System navigation avionics went haywire, forcing the pilots
to turn around. A GPS receiver uses signals from orbiting satellites to
determine its location, altitude and speed.
"This was the first time we've done it, so it was the first time we saw
it," said Col. Tom Bergeson, an F-22A pilot and commander of the 1st
Operations Group, Langley Air Force Base, Va., which deployed the
Raptors.
When the incident occurred, Bergeson was at Nellis Air Force Base,
Nev., where 14 Raptors from the 1st were flying and fighting in a Red
Flag exercise.
Faced with malfunctioning GPS and in the early stage of a 12-hour,
over-water flight to Kadena Air Base, Japan, the F-22As turned back to
Hickam Air Force Base, Hawaii, Bergeson said.
Retracing their steps, the F-22As took their navigation cues from the
KC-135 tankers that were to have refueled them during the flight.
Once the jets landed at Hickam, technicians began troubleshooting the
avionics.
"Within a matter of hours, they identified what the problem was,"
Bergeson said.
In less than 48 hours, F-22A contractor Lockheed Martin delivered a
software fix. An F-22A at Nellis successfully flew with the updated
software, Bergeson said. Then the software patch was relayed to Hickam
for installation.
On Feb. 16, the jets were ready to make their second attempt to reach
Kadena. In two sets, 10 Raptors arrived at Kadena on Feb. 17 and 18,
the Air Force said. The two remaining F-22s diverted to Wake Island
when one of the Raptors developed electrical generator problems. They
arrived at Kadena by Feb. 21.
The Kadena mission marks the Raptor's first overseas deployment. From
the base in Okinawa, the jets will fly training missions with Air Force
and Navy aircraft assigned to the Far East, said Lt. Col. Wade
Tolliver, commander of the jet's 27th Fighter Squadron. The deployment
will also give F-22 maintainers practice repairing the jets at a
deployed location on the distant end of a supply chain. The deployment
is expected to last three to four months.
Bergeson said the software problem was unusual for the Raptor.
When the plane was in developmental stages a few years ago, pilots
flying the Raptor would often have to reboot the onboard computers that
controlled the jet's high-end functions.
"Today, when we are flying it, it just doesn't happen any more,"
Bergeson said. "It's a very, very rare occurrence where I am losing my
integrated avionics."
Beyond what Bergeson offered, the Air Force is saying little about what
went wrong over the dateline. The problem, however, overshadowed the
F-22A's accom-plishments at its first Red Flag.
Over a span of two weeks at Nellis, the F-22As flew 20 missions against
Air Force aggressor squadrons and anti-aircraft threats, Bergeson said.
In all those missions and dozens of dogfights, only one F-22A was
scored as a loss and no sorties were missed because of aircraft
problems.
Bergeson compared the air-to-air missile that knocked out the Raptor to
a "mulligan," a free second shot given to a golfer.
Air Force officials, currently making budget requests to lawmakers on
Capitol Hill, want to buy 20 Raptors in 2008 and another 20 in 2009.
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