A US-made Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System (Auto GCAS) that Taiwan bought for its F-16V jets is scheduled to undergo final testing next year, a source said yesterday.
The military in April 2021 signed a contract with Washington to install the Auto GCAS on the F-16Vs. Initial testing began in November that year, and integration testing is in progress, the person said.
Once that is completed, final installation testing of the system is to be carried out next year on F-16s in Taiwan by the US Air Force, with implementation to follow, the source said on condition of anonymity.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
The Auto GCAS was purpose-built to reduce incidents of what is known as controlled flight into terrain, according to US defense contractor Lockheed Martin, which codesigned the system with the US Air Force and NASA.
Since the system was implemented in US Air Force jets in late 2014, it has been credited with saving the lives of 10 pilots in nine F-16s, Lockheed Martin says on its Web site.
In one instance, an F-16 student pilot lost consciousness during a training mission, and the system pulled the aircraft up after it determined that a ground collision was imminent.
Taiwan’s air force said in January last year that it had purchased the Auto GCAS after it lost one F-16V and its pilot in a crash.
The jet, piloted by captain Chen Yi (陳奕), disappeared from the military’s radar on the afternoon of Jan. 11, about 30 minutes after it departed from Chiayi Air Base on a routine training mission with another aircraft.
Chen had completed a series of simulated missile launches when the jet abruptly nosedived into the sea near the Aogu Wetlands (鰲鼓濕地), according to the pilot of the other aircraft and a ground controller.
Chen’s body was found three days later, and an autopsy revealed that the 27-year-old had died from multiple blunt force trauma caused by a high-speed impact.
A team was assembled to investigate the cause of the crash, but their findings have not been released.
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