Le Bourget, France—Although Boeing has partnered successfully with BAE Systems on building the T-45 Goshawk jet trainer for the Navy, it is “keeping its options open” about how it will approach the Air Force’s T-X trainer aircraft competition, said Boeing Military Aircraft President Chris Chadwick. That includes teaming with other partners, or even a clean-sheet design, Chadwick told reporters here Tuesday at the Paris Air Show. He said he thinks the T-X will be a completely new kind of training system, with far heavier emphasis on simulators and less on airplanes in order to hold down cost and risk. “That’s the future,” he said. (For more T-X coverage from Paris, read Budget Pressures on Future Trainer.)
Members of the Air Force Reserve’s 920th Rescue Wing helped save 11 airplane crash survivors off the coast of Florida on May 12. The Reserve Airmen were flying an HC-130J Combat King II and an HH-60W Jolly Green II on a routine training flight when a Coast Guard call diverted…