Lockheed Martin (LM) has announced that the second flight test T-50A took its inaugural flight on February 20 from its Greenville, South Carolina, facility. The second production-ready T-50A is based at the LM Advanced Pilot Training (APT) operations center in Greenville and, according to the company, the aircraft is an established, lowest-risk offering in the US Air Force’s T-X competition.
In February 2016, Lockheed Martin announced its plan to offer the T-50A in the APT competition and build the aircraft at a final assembly and checkout (FACO) facility in Greenville. Lockheed Martin formally unveiled its T-50A FACO and operations center in August 2016.
The T-50A is ready on day one of the contract award, the company says, and is purpose-built around fifth generation thinking. The T-50A will train the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II pilots of tomorrow, as well as pilots for frontline fourth generation aircraft.
The T-50A builds upon the proven heritage of the T-50. There are more than 150 T-50s flying today, and they have amassed over 200,000 flight hours while more than 1,800 pilots have trained in the aircraft type.
February 22, 2017
Edited by Michael Jones
