Some of the USAF's 200 pilots who fly F-22's have chosen to stop flying based on something mysterious that seems to cause hypoxia or some toxic phenomenon when flying the Raptor, and these two guys are being called whistle-blowers:

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7407680n

So....a question for you veterans here:

if the USAF says the plane is safe enough to fly, can a military pilot basically just refuse to do so?

As a GA pilot, I can of course decide not to fly a plane ...for any reason. How's that work for an Air Force pilot?

It's all right here.

It's all right here.

One must assume one's wings are subject to being turned in with the flight gear to the supply folks. Part of our job is to help the leadership with an honest assessment of the risk. If the boss then says the risks are mitigated, and controls put in place to address the risk, or a material fix, or even "checked, found OK", then get off our dead ass and go fly.

If the aircraft was cheaper, would this be a story? I'm sure we could find an F-15 driver that would prefer not to fly because the fuselage might separate in flight. Or a Black Hawk driver that is afraid the stabilator fly by wire will run-away. Those guys have all the right in the world to do something else with their lives. No hard feelings. But those are the same dudes that rarely have all of the facts. 60 minutes isn't interested in the facts.

Unfortunatly, this plays like another 60 minutes hit piece I was involved in back in the '80s. The target then was the "dangerous" NVGs used in Army aviation. They found a pilot or two that was concerned with flying NVGs and interviewed them for the show. Then we had to fly the 60 minutes people (in my buddy's aircraft), and camera crew (in my aircraft) on an NVG mission.

The narrative was well established long before the flights and inteviews. The pilots interviewed were put in the shadow with the voice over, but there was no mistake who they were, and the one from our unit had been flunking his NVG checkrides. Go figure.

3000 hours of NVG logged flying later (half my total time), I would still not leave home without them.

F22 guys will figure it out. Most of them know a safety stand-down can be healthy on occasion. But if it's time to go fly, those guys will be sprinting to the flightline.

I'll fly one of those expensive beasts.. no problem!

This can't be as safe as kindergarden.

These risk averse politics crippled and led to the demise of space travel!

I found that 60 minutes story to be total sensationalism by an interviewer that had way too much plastic surgery.

My simple math = If it's on 60 Minutes, I don't believe it.

OK. I get that 60 Minutes slants every story they do.

But....in the interview, these 2 pilots are saying that they -- and others -- are refusing to fly the F-22 even when told to do so.

Is that "court-martialable"?
Does a military pilot have any right -- as does a GA pilot -- to decide for himself as PIC that a plane is not safe enough to fly?

Arlen, Yes and no. There is a Senior NCO that reviews the aircraft status for the first flight of the day. He does this through several sources. Once he has verified the aircraft is Mission capable he signs an exceptional release. This release is basicly a return to service statement. Once signed the NCO is stating the aircraft is good to go. The pilot is then told the aircraft is crew ready. What he does with the plane after that is up to him. If he refuses to fly he will have to document in the aircraft forms his discrepency. He will then have to hope he is given a spare aircraft by the Aircraft Maintenance Production Superintendent. All writes up made by the aircraft will be worked by maintenance, if an aircrew continues to write up items that are CND'd by maintenance, eventually he'll have same explaining to do and it is possible (though rarely) that he ends up finishing his Commission as something other than a pilot.

We've been here before with the F-100, with pilots coming out against REMF's who were saying that everything was just fine and dandy. It wasn't (look up "Sabre Dance")Unfortunately, it took a lot of blood to get the Air Force motivated to fix what ailed the Super Sabre. Over the lifetime of its service, 889 of them were destroyed in accidents, with the deaths of 324 pilots. The deadliest year for F-100 accidents was 1958, with 116 aircraft destroyed, and 47 pilots killed.
How many Raptors are there? 200?
60 Minutes may be lying, but the numbers aren't and neither are the pilots. There's a problem, and it needs to be found and corrected. I'd rather embarrass a hundred generals than lose a pilot to a known flaw.
Robin White

I know of one BeechTalk pilot/owner who has extensive Raptor pilot experience. Perhaps he will chime in with his opinion. But another friend of mine flew the F-22 for a while before going back to the F-16 (by choice) and he had some interesting things to say about the jet and some of it's "issues."

-Neal

Pretty much.

This is going to be interesting and I doubt anyone will go to a court martial for refusing to fly it - especially since they've thrown the whistleblower card.

On the other hand, will anyone face charges for saying this thing is safe to fly?

The problem is obvious, they're running the F-22s ROP, but they are a twin so doesn't that make them safer?

Only if the pilot remains conscious.