Test crews at Edwards AFB, Calif., got a little help from an Air Force team of mobile civil engineers during F-35 brake testing recently. Airmen from the 823rd Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineers, out of Hurlburt Field, Fla., and the 820th RED HORSE, assigned to Nellis AFB, Nev., set up a mobile aircraft arresting system on Edward’s 12,000-foot inside runway. The braking system is designed to provide an extra layer of protection in the event of an emergency during the taxiing and brake testing. It is similar to ones used to catch aircraft landing on carriers and is made from a modified B-52 braking system. Once the F-35 brake testing is complete, the RED HORSE engineers will remove the MAAS. (Edwards release by Kenji Thuloweit)
The Air Force wants to pump more than $12 billion over the next five years into its new affordable long-range missiles program and recently asked industry to push the flights of some of those munitions beyond 1,200 miles.