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F-35B, integration tests between the Air Force and the Navy

2 years ago babelfish

F-35B, integration tests between the Air Force and the Navy

How did the inter-force and multidomain integration activity with F-35B conducted by the Navy and Air Force in Pantelleria go?

Second integration test for the Italian Air Force and Navy F-35Bs.

The joint exercise involving the F – 35B assets of the Navy and the Air Force took place yesterday at the Pantelleria Airport Detachment. The Defense announced it.

The objective of the joint-force exercise is to increase expeditionary capacity from the ground through the use of an "austere" base not suitable for the flight operations of conventional take-off aircraft and to make the F-35B assets of the Navy interact and the Air Force in the joint capacity development process.

The F-35B is the "short take-off and vertical landing variant" of the F-35, the fifth generation fighter aircraft of the Joint Strike Fighter program. The Italian Navy bought 15 F-35Bs. The Air Force also ordered the same quantity of Model B, as well as 60 F-35A Ctol (conventional take-off).

A further step therefore towards the integrated Navy Aeronautical group project of the F-35Bs.

All the details.

THE TRAINING EVENT IN PANTELLERIA

The training event on January 27 “is fully part of the development process of joint forces, strongly supported by the Minister of Defense Lorenzo Guerini” underlines the note from the Defense Staff.

In addition to the Chief of Defense Staff, Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the two leaders of the armed forces attended the event: the Chief of Staff of the Navy, Admiral Enrico Credendino and the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, General of Luca Goretti Air Team.

Taking advantage of the Short Takeoff and Vertical Landing (STOVL) features, the F-35B assets of the two Armed Forces landed at the “expeditionary” Pantelleria Airport Detachment, explains the note. Furthermore, they carried out a ground refueling activity with the engines running, in technical jargon “hot-pit”, from a KC-130J aircraft of the 46th Air Brigade of Pisa, through the particular ALARP system (Air Landed Aircraft Refueling Point).

Following this, based on an operational / exercise scenario, the two F-35 Bs and two additional EF2000s conducted complex operations known as Comao, Composite Air Operations.

STEP FORWARD AFTER EXERCISE ON CAVOUR SHIP

The exercise marked a further step forward in the integration process of fifth generation multirole aircraft, started with the international exercise last November 2021 with the Italian F-35Bs landing on the British ship (HMS Queen Elizabeth); American F-35Bs that pinned on the Italian ship (Cavour) and F-35Bs of the Air Force and Navy that pinned on Nave Cavour in synergy.

HOW THE INTEGRATION WILL TAKE PLACE ACCORDING TO THE CHIEF OF SMD

"The goal is to achieve expeditionary capacity both from land and from on board the Naval Units using the F – 35 B assets of the Navy and the Air Force in an integrated and synergistic way, in compliance with the prerogatives of the Chiefs of the Armed Forces" he underlined the Chief of Defense Staff, Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone.

"There will be increasingly profitable synergies that will allow a unitary use of STOVL capacity" explained the Head of Smd. That is, "depending on the domain of reference, the F 35 B can be sold under the operational control of one or the other Armed Force, always responding to the Chief of Defense Staff through the Joint Chiefs of Operations".

END OF THE TENSIONS BETWEEN AERONAUTICS AND MARINE?

These two activities of joint use of Navy and Air Force F-35B aircraft lead to a long period of tension between the two Armed Forces regarding the assignment of aircraft and the use of differentiated bases.

In fact, so far there has been a real “dispute between the Arma Azzurra and the“ Blu ” for the delivery and use of the short take-off and vertical landing specimens of the Joint Strike Fighter” recalled Silvio Lora Lamia in AnalysisDifesa .

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/f-35b-prove-di-integrazione-tra-aeronautica-e-marina/ on Fri, 28 Jan 2022 13:17:02 +0000.