Officials and visitors at Dover AFB, Del., broke ground on a new C-17 training facility and celebrated the expected arrival of the aircraft. Dover is getting a new $5.6 million state-of-the-art training facility that will feature a new full-motion C-17 aircraft simulator from Boeing’s St. Louis factory, said Capt. Scott McAuliffe, Air Force project manager for the facility. The simulator will help ease the transition from C-5s to C-17s. The Air Force plans to send nine of Dover’s 27 C-5s to other bases, making way for 13 new C-17s slated for arrival in summer 2007.
The emphasis on speed in the Pentagon’s newly unveiled slate of acquisition reforms may come with increased near-term cost increases, analysts say. But according to U.S. defense officials, the new weapons-buying construct provides the military with enough flexibility to prevent runaway budget overruns in major programs.
