‘True sense of fear’: US military expands pilot training at virtual test range created for F-35 By Jan Tegler 13 April 2024
https://www.flightglobal.com/fixed-w...157737.article
"US Navy (USN) officials revealed this week that a virtual test range originally created to assess the mission effectiveness of Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighters has also quietly been in use since 2022 to provide American and international fighter pilots with advanced training that cannot be replicated in the real world....
...The unique, realistic training provided by the JSE already led the US military to add F-22 cockpit simulators to the system. Officials are also working to bring Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet, EA-18G Growler and Northrop Grumman E-2D Advanced Hawkeye simulators online.
“Just two weeks ago, we went over 1,000 F-35 pilots trained in this environment,” Summers says....
...Pilots who train at the JSE come away understanding its value as the only training environment “short of war” that realistically simulates how they would fight peer adversaries in actual air combat, Summers says.
“Often, the operators say this is the first time sitting in a cockpit [that] they have had a true sense of fear,” he adds. “That’s because the threat representation is high quality. That F-35 operator is getting visible and audible warnings. They’re getting engaged with weapons. They’re getting punished if they make mistakes tactically.”"
JPG:
https://d3lcr32v2pp4l1.cloudfront.ne...773_789137.jpg “The USN’s JSE provides a “hyper-realistic digital range” and includes actual fighter-jet cockpits (an F-35), allowing pilots to experience a “near-exact virtual environment”, the USN says” Source: US Navy/Terri Thomas
This USN-released video says the Joint Simulation Environment "can create endlessly complex, dense and specific scenarios through a high-speed, adaptive, physics-based environment". Source: Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division
F-35 Joint Simulation Environment - One Night
