F-35 Thought It Was on Ground, Pilot Had To Eject

While most crash survivors will wonder at how fast things happened, an Air Force F-35 pilot had almost an hour to analyze his predicament before experiencing that fate. According to an Air Force investigation, the nosegear on the $200 million fighter failed to retract fully when the aircraft took off from Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska last Jan. 28. The pilot asked for help and ended up on a 50-minute conference call with Lockheed Martin engineers and Air Force officials before the plane became uncontrollable and he had to quickly eject. The pilot was OK and the airplane was destroyed.

In the report, the Air Force says water in the hydraulics system froze in the 0 degrees Fahrenheit conditions to prevent the gear retraction. The conference call resulted in the pilot doing a couple of touch and goes on the mains to try to shake the gear loose but that just made things worse. The main gear struts absorbed the shock of the landings but did not extend back to their unloaded position. That messed with the “Weight on Wheels” sensors in the main gear and told the computer the aircraft was now on the ground, and it transitioned to its taxi mode. “However, because it was actually airborne, the mishap aircraft was uncontrollable,” the report said. “The pilot successfully ejected and emergency responders were at the scene within a minute.”