Highest Accident Rate in Air Force History

Jargon-master, what is a “Class A” accident to the United States Air Force? That would be on which causes at least $1 million in damage. For an airplane that costs an average of $339 million each to produce (the going-forward incremental cost of each new fighter is a “cheap” $177 to $247 million each, depending on the volume of planes actually built), getting $1 million in damage is not particularly challenging. But with a limited edition, single seat, twin engine, land-based, supersonic stealth fighter once destined to become America’s premiere fighter, the F-22 Raptor, with a target production level north of 180 aircraft, this fighter’s propensity to crash or embrace major “Class A” accidents (six through 2009), but really serious class accidents, all in a world where there are only 62 planes built, is really scary... and profoundly expensive.

In the testing phase, there was a Y-22 that crashed on landed (April 1992), but once it was pressed into service, the accidents kept on rolling. Wikipedia takes it from there: “The first crash of a production F-22 occurred during takeoff at Nellis Air Force Base on 20 December 2004, in which the pilot ejected safely prior to impact…. On 25 March 2009, an F-22 crashed 35 miles (56 km) northeast of Edwards Air Force Base during a test flight, resulting in the death of Lockheed test pilot David P. Cooley.” And yes, given this track record along with a host of other major setbacks and component failures, this plane has the highest accident rate in the history of the U.S. Air Force. Trust me, those weren’t combat casualties! But wait, there’s more… On November 16^th, another Raptor went down over Alaska – about 100 miles north of Anchorage – and its pilot, Capt. Jeff A. Haney (pictured above), was killed. Class A accident number seven. Anchorage Daily News (adn.com, November 20^th).

For normal aircraft, the mishaps (Class A level) are often measured at how many per 100,000 hours of flying time. The legendary F-16, for example, tracks at 2 such accidents per 100,000 hours. The F-22, which has logged only 70,000 hours (measured at the end of 2009) since being placed in service in 2002, has a rate of 6 per 100,000 (but it hasn’t flown 100,000 hours yet!), a rate that is expected to drop to a more normal 2 or 3. Yeah, well, they say that the F-22 is one hell of an aircraft; there’s no other plane than can stealth and maneuver like the F-22, a pilot’s dream (if they get to land!). Wikipedia expounds: “Thomas D. Crimmins of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who has written about the possible Israeli strike on Iran says that the F-22 may be the only current aircraft that can evade the Russian S-300 air defense system which the Russians may transfer to Iran.”

But these are downsizing and cost-containing times, the production of this accident prone aircraft may never extend beyond 183 planes, if it even gets that far. The government is in the process of shutting this program down in favor of the F-35, an aircraft of fewer high-level performance characteristics, but one that is both less expensive and can be reconfigured from a land-based jet to a carrier-launched aircraft under a re-engineered version, one that we aren’t worried about sharing with our allies: “No opportunity for export currently exists because the export sale of the F-22 is barred by American federal law. Most current customers for U.S. fighters are either acquiring earlier designs like the F-15, F-16, and F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, or else are waiting to acquire the F-35 Lightning II (Joint Strike Fighter), which contains technology from the F-22 but is designed to be cheaper, more flexible, and available for export from the start. The F-35 will not be as nimble as the F-22 or fly as high or as fast, but its radar and avionics will be more advanced.” Wikipedia, and yeah, the F-22’s radar can be upgraded to match, for a price. Can we really afford this anymore? Really? What does the cost of a couple of fighters less added to the US education budget do? Make us that much stronger and more competitive? Think about it.

I’m Peter Dekom, and when I reread the scale of the above numbers, I just thought to myself, “this is just crazy….”