Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

Disconcerting news: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10 ... -problem/. A pilot has suffered hypoxia and the cause remains unresolved.

"There is no conclusive cause or group of causes that has been established for the incidents that prompted the stand down earlier this year," the Air Force said in a statement Friday.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hP5KzBJ4 ... ideo_title

I think it's time for hearings. LM and the USAF are running out of excuses. I've been an F-22 supporter since long before I could vote. I want to know why the most advanced airframe in our inventory has been left to rot on the vine from a maintenance/upgrade standpoint. Also, has sabotage (industrial or otherwise) figured into the investigation yet?

I experienced acute hypoxia once while skydiving. I personally cannot accept that we should risk a national silver bullet and its patriot to a known phenomenon which is preventable and, I say from experience, scary from a personal viewpoint that undermines confidence. My sole guess, and it is only a guess, as to why the issue is occurring concerns the metal surfaces in that they may barely present adequate surface area for gas interchange given manufacturing tolerances. I am a newbie and am not knowledgeable, so take this with the usual grain of salt on a low sodium diet. Oh, and yes, I should have posted this in an ongoing thread that I missed, sorry.

1st503rdsgt wrote:

I think it's time for hearings. LM and the USAF are running out of excuses. I've been an F-22 supporter since long before I could vote. I want to know why the most advanced airframe in our inventory has been left to rot on the vine from a maintenance/upgrade standpoint. Also, has sabotage (industrial or otherwise) figured into the investigation yet?

Hearings? Why? So our politicians that don't do anything anymore can waste millions to discuss something that is still being investigated?? What a terrible waste of time that would be. Sabotage would probably be looked at carefully...if there was any one single thing happening...which there isn't.

Put LOX bottles back in!?!

They require more maintenance (servicing and what not) but have been in use for many decades.

TEG

Short term, we can fight Raptor without a gun but not absent O2 for the pilot. Stick the oxygen bottles in the gun space if the problem isn't identified and addressed soon. I would hope this issue might constitute a national urgency. It's the friggin' Raptor for sakes.

That_Engine_Guy wrote:

Put LOX bottles back in!?!

They require more maintenance (servicing and what not) but have been in use for many decades.

TEG

2, same!

velocityvector wrote:

A pilot has suffered hypoxia and the cause remains unresolved.

LOL, just what did they expect to happen considering they never fixed it in the first place.

This must be incredibly frustrating to those trying to fix the problem.. it looks like they can't even get past the problem isolation stage after all these months of investigation and scouring the databases for clues.. all the attention isn't helping as well.

Personally I think its not the OBOGS, but rather a problem happening between the OBOGS and the oxygen mask on the pilot.

So, they sent the F-22s back up without figuring out what the problem was in the first place & expecting everything to be fine? How bloody stupid can one get?

Oh yeah, ehm! I tell you what, we're going to make you wear a Ghillie suit made out of raw meat & then we're going to get you to walk through that Lion's den over there through to the other side, they've been starved for two weeks and are a little bit bitey & angry, so they might eat you alive, and they might not. We don't really know how things will work out for you, but hey, we'll risk it. Away you go, good luck, Billy-Bob!

Thats pretty much what they've done to those F-22 pilots and luckily for the pilot and their reputation, he was okay. Putting pilots at risk without knowing these problems will surface again...Surely something needs to be done about that?

7 wrote:

So, they sent the F-22s back up without figuring out what the problem was in the first place & expecting everything to be fine? How bloody stupid can one get?

Oh yeah, ehm! I tell you what, we're going to make you wear a Ghillie suit made out of raw meat & then we're going to get you to walk through that Lion's den over there through to the other side, they've been starved for two weeks and are a little bit bitey & angry, so they might eat you alive, and they might not. We don't really know how things will work out for you, but hey, we'll risk it. Away you go, good luck, Billy-Bob!

Thats pretty much what they've done to those F-22 pilots and luckily for the pilot and their reputation, he was okay. Putting pilots at risk without knowing these problems will surface again...Surely something needs to be done about that?

And I guess you wrote all these nonsense because you know exactly what's happened with that Langley Raptor, right?

Look at the facts, the entire fleet conducted around 1300 sorties since last month (sep 21th).
Yesterday one of the pilots reported "some problems with the oxygen systems" and returned to base (landed safely).
The wing commander decided as act of precaution to ground all the wing raptors.
Now they're trying to varify what was that all about, so the less you can do is stop being arrogant, stop make fool of yourself and let them to the job.
BTW, you can also wish them good luck, just like I do.
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2011/ ... s-102111w/

Hey, when someone says - 'However, the Air Force has not determined what is causing the problem with the jet’s oxygen systems', and still sends their pilots up anyway, and possibly knowing pilots could have the same problems again (which one just did but luckily wasn't serious), I'm sorry but, you're calling the wrong person arrogant. I don't give a monkey's toss how many sorties their precious one and a half trick silver bullet done. The simple fact of the matter is, you don't p*ss about with pilot's lives with something you're not too sure about let alone not finding a solution to a problem!

Get a bloody clue!

That's the media version, you don't know if that's what realy happened!
The investigation just started and you're running to conclusions too soon
You're acusing them in such horrible things, based on what? newspapers?

Maybe you should get a clue..

If that's not really what happened then perhaps its best not to mention that, just a thought. Though I guess you may have let the cat out of the bag now...

Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

Langley Raptors Grounded Again