Marine Makes Debut Flight in Joint Strike Fighter
By Nathan Hodge March 19, 2009 | 5:30:11 PM

A Joint Strike Fighter took off today for the first time with a U.S. Marine at the controls.

Maj. Joseph Bachmann, a Marine test pilot, flew an F-35A for an hour and 20 minutes from a Lockheed Martin facility in Fort Worth, Texas. The F-35 is supposed to enter operational service with the Marines in 2012; the service has already picked a cadre of instructor pilots to start training at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., this the summer.

The flight, Bachmann said, "was badass."

According to Bachmann, "The airplane literally leapt off the ground – it didn’t need much coaxing. All the maneuvers I asked it to do, it more than met."

The plane he flew is not the aircraft the Marine Corps wants to acquire, though. The service plans on acquiring the F-35B, a short takeoff and vertical landing variant of the aircraft that will eventually replace F/A-18 Hornet, AV-8B Harrier II and EA-6B Prowler. Bachmann is part of the test team that will do the work to get to the first "hover" of the F-35B.

Bachmann, who served two fleet Harrier tours and worked as a Forward Air Controller in between -- will be the government test pilot as the developers continue to do ground and flight tests with the STOVL airplane. But even as the test program continues, the Government Accountability Office is worried about the potential financial risks of the Joint Strike Fighter procurement.

A new GAO report says that the Pentagon's plans to accelerate JSF procurement could cost an additional $33.4 billion over the next several fiscal years. "Procuring large numbers of production jets while still working to deliver test jets and mature manufacturing processes does not seem prudent, and looming plans to accelerate procurement will be difficult to achieve cost effectively," the agency warned.

[PHOTO: John Wilson/Lockheed Martin]

Ellie