Video: The $113.5 million F-35B Lightning II can float in the air for a little bit
Tech Saturday, March 20th, 2010
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There’s a certain amount of pride in seeing a country pump out something like the new F-35B Lightning II fighter jet. At $113.5 million per aircraft, it’s about as far away from the meaning of the word “inexpensive” as possible. It makes you think, well, if we can afford things like that , why can’t we afford things like this ? But, whatever. The entire purpose of this post is to watch a legitimately exciting video. So, let’s! The very first test flight of the aircraft happened yesterday , and lasted 14 minutes long. (Yes, there’s a certain irony in finding out about the latest American military technology in the British press.) That works out to $8.1 million per minute in the air. Granted, that’s a horrible way of looking at the aircraft, but it’s a fun stat nonetheless. The F-35B Lightning II has been in development since 2001, and it was originally promoted as an affordable option to keeping old birds like the F-16 and F-10A in the air. The marines will start using the jet, if all goes according to plan, in December, 2012. And now I’m off to play Battlefield: Bad Company 2 , using more terribly expensive weapons to beat up Kirilenko .