The first Lockheed Martin F-35C carrier variant of the Joint Strike Fighter arrived at NAS Patuxent River, Maryland, on November 6. Flown by David 'Doc' Nelson, CF-1 departed Fort Worth to join the test effort at Tax'alongside the F-35B. The F-35C and the F-35A at Edwards AFB, California, are both ahead of schedule in flight test this year; however, the troubled F-35B STOVL variant was 41 flights behind schedule as of October. The overall F-35 program plan called for 51 flights in November, working towards a total of 394 for 2010. Although the first two F-35As had been scheduled to arrive at Eglin AFB in November, the first two Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP) aircraft (AF-6/AF-7) will be'loaned'to help support the System Design and Development (SDD) phase. They will join the Integrated Test Force at Edwards, and be fitted with Block 1.0 avionics.The33rd Fighter Wing at Eglin has been forced to slip its training program, which will now begin in late summer 2011.
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