B-2 Bomber Crashes on Guam

That would cramp my ride.

 

bound to happen sooner or later....i guess the real question is... has there ever been an aircraft of any kind that has never crashed?(not counting testing or being shot down)

i know we had some pretty sophisticated aircraft with remarkable reliability out there. i would have to check on it, but what about the SR-71 Blackbird?

 

There has been at least one SR-71 crash.

Tom

 

The B777 was there until recently. The Concorde had a pretty good "streak".

A380. "B"717.

 

Sigh!

<opens up wallet>

 

Quite a few more than that. About a third of them have been lost to crashes. I was stunned when I read the statistics.

 

so was i. those things cost a bundle too... in fact, probably pretty close to the same amount of money

 

The cost in 1966 was estimated at $34,000,000.00 USD. Adjusted for inflation that would be around $250,000,000.00-$300,000,000.00 USD today. It cost between $150-$250 million per year to maintain them.

The B2 costs between $800 million or as much as $2.5 billion, depending on who you ask. There were 21 B-2s. Now there are 20 about a 5% reduction. In terms of money, that's equivalent to 20 F-15s, 24 F-16s or 10 F-22s.

This aircraft was designed in the 80's and is already nearing it's 20th birthday, first flight 07-17-1989 and has flown missions over 50 hours.

Wildkow

p.s. The cost for a pilot? Priceless, thank goodness they are ok. :usa2:

 

Any word what caused the crash?

Tom

 

Gbee42, if there is a cause identified, I don't think we will be the first to learn of it. I did read that the B2 fleet is going to take a week off at least, which is perhaps something less drastic than a stand-down.

So, do such aircraft have black boxes? (flight data recorders)

 

Good thing that doesn't come out of the pilots' paycheck!

 

I would be surprised if the cause, or the investigation, is ever made public.

Yes, they do.