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SEA AIR SPACE 2024 — A recent Navy contract award may have extended the lifespan of Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet production for a couple more years, but after failing to find additional customers, the aerospace giant plans to close up shop on the legacy fighter after 2027, a Boeing executive tells Breaking Defense. “We ran a number of international campaigns or competitions that we were unsuccessful in previous years,” Mark Sears, Boeing vice president for fighters, said in an interview. “Those kind of played out and there are no active discussions with the Navy about additional F-18s beyond these.” Boeing...

An unmanned tanker drone successfully refueled a fighter jet in mid-air during a test flight on Friday. The impressive feat, which involved a Navy F/A-18 Super Hornet, demonstrated the significant potential of unmanned tanker drones and could mark the beginning of the end for traditional piloted tanker aircraft. During the test flight, the drone - a Boeing-built device named MQ-25 Stingray - maintained its altitude and speed as the hose extended and the two aircraft briefly linked up to exchange fuel. The test was carried out from the MidAmerica St. Louis Airport in Mascoutah, Illinois. In total, 325lbs of fuel...

A Navy F/A-18E Super Hornet crashed in California on Tuesday morning during a routine training flight. The pilot ejected safely and is being examined at a local medical facility, said Lt. Cmdr. Lydia Bock, a spokeswoman for Strike Fighter Wing Pacific. The crash occurred at about 10:10 a.m. local time near Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, about 150 miles northeast of Los Angeles. The Super Hornet, assigned to Naval Air Station Lemoore, was on a routine training flight when it experienced a mishap, Bock said. No additional details were provided about the cause of the crash. "The U.S. Navy...

"... In service with the Navy and Marine Corps since 1983, the flexible design has gone through a Porsche 911-like evolution. Two type series of the original Hornet, the A/B and C/D preceded the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, a larger more capable version of the F/A-18 introduced in 1999. Since then the Super Hornet has been updated with “Block II” models and now there’s a “Block III” Super Hornet....

BEIRUT, LEBANON (1:45 P.M.) – The United States tested the new smart bomb, GBU-53 StormBreaker, using one of their modern warplanes. According to reports, the U.S. Navy’s FA-18E/F Super Hornet fighter and attack aircraft launched the GBU-53 StormBreaker all-weather bomb on a designated target. The new bomb can be used in all weather conditions, including poor visibility, Janes Defense reported last week. An RMD spokesperson told Janes that the U.S. Air Force determines the number of tests needed to validate the bomb, but did not specify when it would be available. “The USAF (US Air Force) program office, in co-ordination...

As part of our ongoing and in-depth coverage of the military's increasingly publicized encounters with UFOs, we want to share with you exclusive correspondence between F/A-18 Super Hornet pilot Ryan Graves and The War Zone. Graves is one of a handful of Navy tactical jet aircrewmen that recently stepped forward regarding a near constant string of encounters with UFOs while training off the southeast coast of the U.S. between 2014 and 2015. In the message, he answers our question regarding statements that the mysterious craft followed his unit while on cruise to the Persian Gulf aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt....

Get a good look at the U.S. Navy Blue Angels while you have a chance. They will be changing to a new plane in a couple of years. The Pensacola News Journal reports the team plans to switch from the F/A-18 Hornet to the F/A-18E Super Hornet in 2021 to mark the team's 75th anniversary. "The jet is more powerful, especially at lower altitudes, so we believe that our maneuvering will be more visible to the crowd and more impressive overall," Cmdr. Frank Weisser, a former Blue Angel pilot, told the Journal.

Boeing Is Pitching the US a New F-15, Using Its Super Hornet Game Plan The company convinced the Trump administration to buy advanced F/A-18 jets. Can it do the same with the the F-15? FARNBOROUGH, UK — Boeing is quietly pitching the U.S. Air Force a new F-15 fighter jet using the same business strategy that convinced the Trump administration to buy more Super Hornet warplanes for the Navy. Dubbed the F-15X, the new variant of the venerable jet offers more modern flight controls, cockpit displays, and radar, according to military and industry sources with knowledge of the plan. The...

Photos by Petty Officer 2nd Class Timothy SchumakerBoeing has received a $17 million contract for convert nine F/A-18E/F Super Hornet aircraft for Blue Angels flight demonstration team, said in the statement of the U.S. Department of Defense on 13 August. The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has contracted Boeing for the retrofit documentation and kits to convert nine F/A-18E (single-seat) and two F/A-18F (tandem-seat) aircraft into a Blue Angel configuration in accordance with engineering change proposal 6480. According to the DoD, work will be performed in St. Louis, Missouri, and is expected to be completed in December 2021. The Blue...

The esoteric subject of fighter aircraft contracting, usually restricted in the Indian context to the occasional headline, boomed within the walls of India’s Parliament a week ago. In the eye of the proverbial storm was — and continues to be — India’s purchase of 36 Rafale fighter aircraft from France. With less than a year to go for the country’s next national election, one that promises to outstrip all earlier elections in its assurance of a historically no-holds-barred fight, the aircraft deal is now a fully loaded political weapon, where the noise has helpfully blurred many of the questions being...

Boeing is pushing ahead with the Block III F/A-18E/F Super Hornet program for the U.S. Navy, which includes new build aircraft and upgraded planes, and will significantly enhance the lifespan and capabilities of the jets. At the same time, there are no formal plans to upgrade the fighter's engines or add conformal fuel tanks to the service’s EA-18G electronic warfare aircraft, which could limit Carrier Air Wings’ ability to take full advantage of the added capabilities. On May 23, 2018, Boeing hosted a media day at its offices in Washington, D.C. to provide the latest updates on the program’s status....

Boeing executives, including president and CEO Dennis Muilenburg, welcomed on Friday the first of potentially hundreds of well-used Navy F/A-18 Super Hornets that will return to the company’s north St. Louis County campus for upgrades designed to extend the life of the Navy’s workhorse aircraft. The fighter jet, with just under 6,000 flight hours under its belt, is one of four Block II Super Hornets that will be delivered to Boeing this year to undergo an 18-month Service Life Modification (SLM) program meant to extend the flight hours of the aircraft carrier-based fighter to 9,000 hours. Moving forward, funded by...

Despite having soured relations with the Canadian government with a major trade dispute, Boeing is reportedly still planning to submit a bid on the contract to replace the Royal Canadian Air Force’s aging CF-18A+ Hornets, almost certainly offering new F/A-18E/F Super Hornets. The Chicago-headquartered plane maker could try to make its submission more attractive by including upgrades its already working on for the Super Hornet, such as the range-extending conformal fuel tanks it is developing for the U.S. Navy. On Feb. 15, 2018, Reuters, citing unnamed sources, reported that Boeing had formally applied to be a part of Canada’s fighter...

Boeing has disclosed that the expected service life extension program for the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18E/F Super Hornets could include stealth features and improved avionics and mission systems in addition to a more general airframe overhaul. This more comprehensive update would not only keep the aircraft safely flying at least until 2040, but could potentially make them a capable, but low-cost alternative in many scenarios compared to the service’s up-coming F-35C Joint Strike Fighters or any future sixth generation design. On Oct. 17, 2017, Mark Sears, director of Boeing’s Super Hornet service life modification (SLM) division, told Aviation Week that the...

When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reopened the competition to select a fighter to replace the CF-18, two questions were raised from that decision, one with long-term implications, and one with immediate consequences. The first: when will the modernization of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) fighter force be complete? The second: what will the RCAF do to mitigate the so-called capability gap (Canada’s current fleet is more than 30 years old, and down from 138 to 77 aircraft) to have a certain number of the most capable fighter jets mission-ready at all times and to ensure the capacity to address...

As Canada continues to struggle with what to do about its participation in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, attempts to buy interim replacements for its aging CF-18A+ Hornets have turned into a saga of their own. The country's military is desperately scrounging around for places like Kuwait and Australia for second-hand fighter jets to bolster their existing fleet in the wake of a rhetorically charged trade dispute between Canadian firm Bombardier and Super Hornet maker Boeing. On Sept. 28, 2017, Canadian Defense Minster Harjit Sajjan revealed that Canada had and might still be considering buying second-hand F/A-18C/D Hornets from...

The Naval Light Combat Aircraft (N-LCA) | Photo: Angad Singh At the annual Navy Day press conference, held on December 02, 2016, Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Sunil Lanba told media that the Indian Navy had elected not to field the naval variant of the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA), and would look abroad for new fighters. For the less well informed, this was a stunning volte-face from the Service that has unstintingly backed domestic procurement programmes and has contributed considerable funding to the development of an indigenous carrier fighter. To the slightly more clued in, however, the announcement had been...

Indian Navy MiGs mounted combat air patrols defending a warship against US Navy F/A-18 Super Hornets NEW DELHI: When Russia deployed its sole aircraft carrier, the Kuznetsov off the coast of Syria earlier this year, a newly-developed fighter jet onboard the ship had many Western powers operating in the region intrigued, if not concerned. The jet in question was the MiG-29K, a brand new Navalised variant of one of the most successful Russian fighters ever built, the MiG-29, a jet that's been in service with the Indian Air Force since the mid-eighties. But the MiG-29K is a very different beast....

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Navy intends to buy at least 80 more Boeing F/A-18E-F Super Hornets over the next five years to address its fighter shortfall, a change from its previous on-the-books plan to zero out the aircraft program beginning next year, service officials said in congressional testimony today. The Navy’s written testimony to the Senate Armed Services seapower subcommittee notes the “Fiscal Year 2018 President’s Budget requests $1.25 billion in [the Navy’s aircraft procurement account] for 14 F/A-18E/F Super Hornet aircraft” and that, “with the support of Congress, we will also procure a minimum of 80 additional Super Hornets...

A current dispute between the Canadian government and the Montreal-based aircraft maker Bombardier on the one side, and Boeing on the other, appears to be proving one thing: Protectionism begets protectionism. The quarrel heated up a few weeks ago, when Boeing launched an anti-dumping petition against Bombardier, asking the U.S. Department of Commerce to find that the latter was guilty of dumping its C Series plane on the U.S. market at below market costs with the help of the Canadian and Quebec governments. Demonstrating an all-too-predictable tit-for-tat approach, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland responded immediately to the move, ordering a...