2015 F-35 DOT&E report: More of the same... With some fudging.
Mmmm... Fudge. The Pentagon's Director Operational Testing and Evaluation (DOT&E) report was released this week allowing us to take a peek at how well the JSF's testing has been going over the last year. This has been an interesting year for the JSF, to say the least. While it has been the brunt of much criticism (including mine), the program has seen quite a bit of progress over the last year. The biggest sigh of relief must have been when two F-35Cs successfully completed carrier landing trials , putting that nasty tailhook problem to bed. Of course, the elephant in the JSF's room for 2014 was the ill-timed engine fire that put a halt to the F-35's international debut at the Royal International Air Tattoo (RIAT) and the Farnborough Air Show after that . A fix has been devised for engine issue, but flight restrictions were put in place, keeping F-35 test pilots from testing the aircraft's limits. None of this is any surprise to those who h...