As B
oeing prepares to field Avionics Modernization Program-upgraded C-130 airlifters in 2010, the company is also training USAF flight crews and maintenance personnel. The flight crews get 50 hours in classroom instruction and 12 in a simulator-like engineering test device. Maintainers spend time on academic and lab work and get to work hands on with an AMP aircraft. The company’s former Air Force and Navy instructors already have trained more than 100 USAF personnel. According to a Boeing statement, the company will conduct C-130 AMP training over the next several years as the modification is integrated into each of the various models.
A new report from the Government Accountability Office calls for the Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer to have budget certification authority over the military services’ research and development accounts—a move the services say would add a burdensome and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.
