News Archive

Luke Air Force Base got a boost in its efforts to remain open after Congress granted the base a $14.3 million wish.The money, part of a Military Construction appropriation request, will be used for development rights and land acquisition around Luke....

A look at how "offsets" and other agreements figure into an important F-16 sale. With offset agreements being the only way to make the sale, the following article gives a bit of a snapshot of how the F-16 is sold. In the end, it is usually the U.S. taxpayer that picks up the tab....

The long-awaited Israeli F-16I Sufa ('Storm') rolled off Lockheed Martin's production line in Texas.It is the first of 102 ordered by Israel in 1997. The estimated $4.5 billion dollar F-16I deal will be financed by the annual U.S. military aid package and concludes the largest Israeli military purchase in history....

A group of heavily armed men wearing ski masks exchanged fire shots with Venezuelan Air Force personnel after they illegally broke into the Libertador Air Base in the city of Maracay, located 80 km from the capital city of Caracas. ...

Raytheon is being awarded a $54.7 million contract modification for the procurement of approximately 596 AIM-9M-2 missiles for the governments of Taiwan and Egypt....

According to a press release by the Eaton company, Lockheed Martin recently had an informal rollout of the F-16 Block 60. The Block 60 configuration incorporates some of the most extensive changes in the history of the F-16 program. ...

Robins Air Force Base signed a partnership agreement with Lockheed Martin to provide depot maintenance and long-term sustainment for the ATP Sniper pod....

A "blip" on a radar screen, rather than a plane, sent scores of White House staff and tourists fleeing the executive mansion on Thursday in fear of another Sept. 11-style attack on the U.S. capital....

PANTERA, the export equivalent to the Lockheed Martin Sniper Extended Range (XR) targeting pod was delivered to the RNoAF for use in their F-16s. PANTERA is the international application of Sniper, which the USAF selected as its Advanced Targeting Pod....

Cannon Air Force Base is a finalist for a top Air Force award - the best maintenance group in Air Combat Command. A team of inspectors visited the base last week to decide whether Cannon should be recognized. ...

A Gulf Coast F-16 wing that has protected the area's petrochemical industry and once included President Bush as a pilot is now threatened by lobbying and another wave of military base closures and realignment, military officials and residents say. The residents and members of the military community fear that the Texas Air National Guard unit, based at Ellington Field, could be moved or reduced in size....

The United States has shipped AIM-120C AMRAAMs to Taiwan after China acquired similar Russian-built technology. ...

Like bettors handicapping a horse race, the military 'experts' of the Internet are predicting the U.S. military bases that will be closed after the next round of base closings....

The first in a fleet of the most advanced F-16s will soon be sent to Israel. Israeli officials said they were pleased with the completion of the first F-16I Soufa, which means "storm" in Hebrew, a more sophisticated version of the F-16....

The Norwegian Department of Defense announced today that a Dutch F-16 accidentally dropped a 500lbs (227 kg) bomb during a weapons instructor course in Norway. The bomb did not detonate....

Lockheed Martin's Sniper XR Advanced Targeting Pod was approved by the U.S. Air Force to advance into Qualification Test & Evaluation (QT&E), a major milestone for the program. QT&E is under way on an F-16 Block 50 aircraft at Nellis Air Force Base, NV, and will continue with the F16 Block 30 through January 2004....

A small civilian plane violated restricted air space around Washington on Monday around 11:15 a.m., causing a brief security alert at the White House before military jets intercepted it and steered it away....

An Israeli delegation will attend the rollout of the first Israeli F-16I Fighting Falcon, scheduled for Friday, November 14th, 2003. The ceremony will take place at Lockheed Martin's Fort Worth facility in Texas....

Today, a Turkish F-16C Block 50 from the Fifth Main Jet Base Command at Merzifon AB crashed during a training flight in the north of the country. Fortunately both the pilot and the co-pilot survived the accident....

The Czech armed forces faces a straight choice between Lockheed Martin-made F-16 Fighting Falcons and JAS-39 Gripen aircraft produced by Saab/BAE Systems to fulfill their mid-term air defense needs after offers were submitted by five countries last Friday....

Air Force officials determined a manufacturing defect of a turbine blade caused an F-16C Block 42 to crash on June 10 at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz....