The troubled realm of Marine aviation will head into 2017 trying to dig out of a readiness hole without knowing how much money the service will get to repair and replace its aging and worn-out fleet.
The depth of the Marines\u2019 aviation crisis became apparent in April, when Marine officials told Congress that only 83 of the Corps\u2019 276 F\/A-18 Hornets could fly. In June, the Marines confirmed they were taking 23 Hornets out of storage and getting another seven from the Navy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The problems have drawn attention from the Pentagon’s top internal watchdog. Between October and December 2017, the inspector general is expected to complete an audit of whether the Marine Corps squadrons have enough aircraft and proficient pilots to meet the minimum standards for mission-essential tasks, said Kathie Scarrah, a spokeswoman for the Defense Department IG’s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Marine Corps hopes to have 162 Hornets flyable by mid-2017 or early 2018, depending how extensive the repairs for each aircraft are, Lt. Gen. Jon Davis, deputy commandant for aviation, said in September.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of all of the Marine Corps\u2019 aircraft, the service\u2019s fleet of heavy-lift helicopters, the CH-53E Super Stallions, has the most significant readiness problem. The Marines are overhauling all 146 CH-53Es and plan to buy 200 new CH-53Ks between 2019 and 2029.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The CH-53K program has four King Stallions currently in flight test and is conducting the objectives required to obtain the Department of the Navy’s permission to enter initial production,” said Kelly Burdick, a spokeswoman for Naval Air Systems Command. “We anticipate this decision as early as February 2017.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even if Congress ultimately passes a spending bill that provides more money for the latter part of 2017, the Marine Corps will have less time to spend it, Marine Commandant Gen. Robert Neller told reporters in December.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“You can only fly so much and you can only let so many contracts,” Neller said on Dec. 7. “I trust the Congress. I think the new administration clearly understands what the situation is. The good news is we got money and we\u2019ll continue to operate and train. The forces that are forward deployed, they\u2019re flying a lot of hours and so far they have been very effective and very safe.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n
The Corps’ F-35B Joint Strike Fighters will probably not make it to sea for a deployment next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Corps is building up its inventory of the new aircraft and starting in 2017, a squadron of 16 new F-35Bs will be permanently based at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan, officials said. The fighters will belong to Marine Aircraft Group 12, part of the 1<\/p>\n\n\n\nst<\/sup>\n\n\n\n Marine Aircraft Wing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Marines\u2019 variant of the F-35 are slated to deploy aboard the amphibious ship Wasp along with the 31<\/p>\n\n\n\nst<\/sup>\n\n\n\n Marine Expeditionary Unit in early 2018, said Marine Corps spokeswoman Capt. Sarah Burns. Later that year, F-35Bs will deploy with a West Coast Marine expeditionary unit aboard the amphibious assault ship America. Currently, there are no plans to send the F-35B to sea earlier than that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Marines need to fix old aircraft and buy new ones, but Congress hasn’t passed a spending bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":69,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[12,67,69],"tags":[],"coauthors":[1187],"class_list":["post-23967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-pentagon-congress","category-your-marine-corps"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"CQN7IQZQEVFHZILN6R3WSVLHIQ","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2016\/12\/28\/new-in-2017-more-challenges-for-marine-aviation\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n