Center Fuselage Rebuild Could Be F-15C/D Achilles? Heel | Defense content from Aviation Week
The F-15C may still have an undefeated aerial combat record, but the 38-year-old aircraft could be slated for retirement if the U.S. Air Force decides not to fund a major structural life-extension program.
Air Combat Command (ACC) chief Gen. Mike Holmes says it could cost $30-40 million per aircraft to keep the Eagle soaring beyond the late 2020s, including rebuilding the center fuselage section, among other refurbishments. “We’re probably not going to do that,” he tells Aviation Week. The better answer, he says, is to rapidly begin buying more fighter aircraft, at least 100 per year. That includes ramping up Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II output once the low-observable fifth-generation aircraft matures, but also successive purchases of air superiority jets under the service’s new Penetrating Counter-Air (PCA) program.
The F-15C is operated primarily by the Air National Guard (ANG) in support of the homeland defense mission, capable of intercepting and shooting down adversary fighters, bombers and cruise missiles. ANG Director Lt. Gen. Scott Rice sent shockwaves through the F-15 community on March 22 when he admitted to Congress that plans are being hatched to retire the 235-aircraft single-seat F-15C fleet and the twin-seat D-model trainers in favor of Lockheed Martin F-16s upgraded with active, electronically scanned array (AESA) radars. In December, the Air Force put Raytheon on contract to replace the mission computers in its F-16 fleet, providing “near-fifth-generation aircraft computing power” with twice the processing output and 40 times more memory. This upgrade is the bedrock on which future Fighting Falcon improvements will be based, including the radar upgrade. The Northrop Grumman APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radar and Raytheon Advanced Combat Radar could compete for that work...........
Holmes says a minimum of 100 new fighters are needed per year to reverse this situation and begin rejuvenating the force. He wants to expand the F-35A build rate to 60 per year, but only after it completes development, to avoid upgrade costs. Air Force Assistant Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Stayce D. Harris tells Congress that the service cannot afford to drop below the minimum operational requirement of 55 fighter squadrons, and would rather grow to 60, about 2,100 aircraft. But it would prefer a healthy force of 55 fighter squadrons with enough pilots and maintainers to support operations than a stressed and undermanned force of 60 units.
ACC says it must retire some fleets to unlock money and personnel to transition to the F-35 and future PCA platform, while still modernizing the F-16 and F-22 fleets. The F-16 and F-15E Strike Eagle are relatively young, with plenty of service life left. The Air Force tried and failed to retire the Fairchild Republic A-10 Warthog, so the F-15C is the next obvious cut. “We’re trying to work out that mix,” Holmes says. “One of those options is, what year does the F-15C go away?”.........