Type of engine used in crashed F-16 has been blamed for other disasters, engineer says

03/22/2000

Associated Press

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas  The type of engine used in the F-16 that crashed at the Kingsville Naval Air Station has been blamed for three aerial disasters since 1995, an aerospace engineer says.

The F110-GE-129 engine was in the F-16 Fighting Falcon being flown by Major Brison Phillips of Euless when it crashed during a weekend air show, killing the combat veteran pilot. Investigators have not determined whether mechanical failure caused the mishap.

Bobby Stone, an aerospace engineer at the Air Force Propulsion Product Group at Kelly Air Force Base in San Antonio, told the Corpus Christi Caller-Times that the military asked Congress for $100 million after several F-16 crashes in 1999 were attributed to engine failure.

The money was used to speed repairs already under way on the engines, manufactured by General Electric. Stone said he did not know whether the engine in the jet being flown by Phillips had been repaired.

Capt. John Hutcheson, public affairs officer with Air Combat Command at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, said investigators had not determined what caused the crash at Air Show 2000. He said the Air Force would not release details of the plane's mechanical history.

Phillips, 35, who was stationed at Shaw Air Force Base near Sumter, S.C., had over 2,300 flight hours of experience in the F-16 Falcon that went down while he performed a "split-S,'' a maneuver in which the plane begins inverting at about 6,500 feet.

Between January 1999 and Sunday, 16 F-16s have suffered "Class A'' crashes  accidents that cost $1 million or more, result in destruction of an Air Force aircraft or a fatality or permanent total disability.

Stone said General Electric is making the repairs to toughen the engine's fan blades, which are used to compress air in the engine. The blades need toughening to withstand impact from bits of debris such as pebbles that sometimes are sucked into a jet's intake.

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-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), March 22, 2000