The Air Force plans to incorporate an Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System in its F-16 Block 40 and Block 50 aircraft in 2014 in order to dramatically reduce the risk of Viper crashes. Since the Air Force fielded the F-16 in 1979, there have been 87 aircraft and 69 lives lost as a result of controlled-flight-into-terrain, or CFIT, mishaps. With Auto GCAS, USAF officials hope to lessen that risk by 98 percent. Auto GCAS will “save lives, and it will save aircraft, and will save a lot more money than it will cost to do it,” said Gen. Donald Hoffman, Air Force Materiel Command boss at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. In addition to the F-16, Air Force officials intend to integrate Auto GCAS on the F-22 and the F-35. They also are looking for ways to add it to older F-16s. (Wright-Patterson report by Daryl Mayer)
NASA Boss: Race to Moon Has National Security Stakes
Sept. 15, 2026
NASA is pushing hard to get astronauts back to the moon by 2028—and the urgency is driven in no small part by the national security implications of doing so before China does, Administrator Jared Isaacman said Sept. 15.
