LONDON (AP) – The failure of the Joint Strike Fighter to travel to England this week for a premier air show heaped further embarrassment on its developers as they try to convince skeptics that the $400 billion program was a price worth paying.
The plane couldn’t cross the Atlantic to be gazed at by industry experts at the Farnborough Airshow in southern England, as experts try to sort out the causes of a recent engine fire – fueling the ammunition of critics who have questioned whether there is a bigger and more systemic problem with the fighter jet.
“It’s another hiccup in a series of them,” said Winslow T. Wheeler, a critic of the program and director of the Straus Military Reform Project.
Wheeler said the complexity of the plane, which is designed to combine stealth, maneuverability and attack capabilities in a single aircraft, makes it vulnerable to multiple troubles. The only thing different now was that the plane was getting close attention because of the airshow, which alternates every year between Paris and Farnborough.
He said the plane’s failure to make it to this year’s show and the ensuing negative publicity will make people wonder about the cost of the fighter, now estimated at $80 million each.