Lockheed Martin has officially delivered the first production F/A-22 Raptor air dominance fighter to the U.S. Air Force. The formal acceptance documents for the aircraft were signed at the Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company facility here on October 23.
As a scheduled part of the F/A-22 program's ongoing developmental efforts, Lockheed Martin has successfully completed the modification and upgrade effort necessary for Raptor 08 to begin Dedicated Initial Operational Test & Evaluation (DIOT&E).
Raptor 11, the first F/A-22 Production Representative Test Vehicle (PRTV) to fly, conducted its maiden flight on September 16, 2002, from the Lockheed Martin facility in Marietta, GA.
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The F-22 Raptor has for the first time successfully conducted a test flight while carrying external stores under its wings.
F-22 4003 became the first Raptor used to successfully fire a radar-guided AIM-120 missile while flying faster than the speed of sound.
The F-22 Raptor, now in production and continuing flight testing in California, continues to meet or exceed all technical performance parameters, Lockheed Martin president Dain Hancock confirmed during a press conference today conducted with U.S. Secretary of the Air Force James Roche.
Lockheed Martin has developed a new horizontal stabilator design for the F-22 Raptor that will save the program $1 million per aircraft shipset of two.
The F-22 Raptor team successfully completed a key phase of logistics testing and evaluation (LT&E) here this week - several days ahead of schedule. This is a major achievement in preparing for the U.S. Air Force to begin Dedicated Initial Operational Test & Evaluation (DIOT&E) next year.
The U.S. Air Force-led F-22 Combined Test Force at Edwards AFB, Calif., has surpassed the 2,000 flight test hours in just over 900 test missions since Raptor 4001 - "the Spirit of America" - first began flying on September 7, 1997.
The Lockheed Martin-led F-22 Raptor team surpassed another significant milestone in May with the successful completion of "first service-life" fatigue testing using a production quality, non-flyable Raptor airframe in a special ground-based laboratory located here.
The F-22 industry team has successfully completed all planned static testing of the F-22, demonstrating that the structural integrity of the airframe can withstand forces 50 percent higher than those expected in service life.
The F-22 Raptor industry team marked a milestone last week, as the newest version of the program's advanced integrated avionics software package - Block 3.1 - was successfully flown for the first time at the Air Force's Combined Test Facility at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.
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The F-22 Raptor industry team formally donated and officially dedicated a 1/10th-scale model of the air dominance fighter jet to the United States Air Force Academy on April 18.
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The F-22 Raptor industry team today delivered to the U.S. Air Force Raptor 4009, the last flight test aircraft to be produced under the program's Engineering & Manufacturing Development (EMD) phase contract.
The F-22 Raptor industry team has received a $215.3 million contract from the U.S. Air Force to purchase long-lead items necessary for the fabrication and assembly of 23 additional air dominance fighters during production Lot 3.
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