Boeing evaluated a new interphone system on the B-52 during a six-hour flight from Edwards AFB, Calif., the company announced. Part of the Combat Network Communications Technology (CONECT) upgrade, “the successful interphone evaluation keeps the CONECT team on track to complete our ground and flight tests by the end of October,” stated Scot Oathout, Boeing’s B-52 CONECT program director. The CONECT program is a multi-year effort to retrofit the B-52 cockpit with moving color maps and flight data displays as well new data links. The Aug. 3 flight cleared the way for formal testing of the voice-communication element which allows the flight crew to communicate with one another, as well as other aircraft and ground units, according to Boeing.
The crash of a T-38 trainer jet this May—which caused a weekslong pause in flights across the fleet—was caused by an improperly installed pin for one of the jet’s horizontal stabilizers, according to a new accident report released Oct. 30. When the pin disengaged midflight, it created the slightest amount…