Airmen from Air Force Reserve Command’s 439th Maintenance Squadron at Westover ARB, Mass., tested the base’s new C-5 mobile tail enclosure, according to a base release. The MTE, “the largest structure of its kind in the Air Force,” is designed to shield a C-5’s tail section—and the maintainers working on it—from the elements when the aircraft is in the base’s smaller sized isochronal inspection hangar, which cannot completely accommodate the massive airplane. Members of the squadron brought a C-5 into the hangar on May 22 and then enclosed the tail with the MTE, completing the first run-through, according to the May 24 release. The Air Force began construction of the $5 million enclosure last year. (Westover report by SrA. Kelly Galloway) (See also video clip of the MTE test.)
Anduril and General Atomics will develop their Collaborative Combat Aircraft for the Air Force, beating out Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman, the service announced on April 24. But any of the non-selected companies can compete to actually manufacture the eventual design, the Air Force said.