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F-16V collision avoidance system final test due next year: Source

ROC Central News Agency

04/02/2023 02:43 PM

Taipei, April 2 (CNA) An American-made Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System (GCAS) that Taiwan bought for its F-16V fighter jets is scheduled to undergo final testing next year, before going online, a source told CNA Sunday.

Taiwan's military signed a contract on April 2021 with the United States to install the GCAS on the F-16Vs, with initial testing starting in November that year, and integration testing is still in progress.

Once that is completed, a final installation testing of the GCAS system on the F-16s will be carried out in Taiwan in 2024 by the U.S. Air Force, before the system officially goes online, according to the source, who asked not to be named.

The Auto GCAS was purpose-built to reduce incidents of what is known as Controlled Flight Into Terrain (CFIT), according to the U.S.-based defense technology company Lockheed Martin that co-designed the system with the U.S. Air Force and NASA.

Since the system was implemented in the U.S. Air Force in late 2014, it has been credited with nine saves -- 10 pilots in nine F-16s, according to Lockheed Martin's website.

Taiwan's Air Force disclosed in January 2022 that it had bought the Auto GCAS for its F-16Vs, after it lost one of the aircraft and its pilot in a crash.

The F-16V, piloted by Chen Yi (陳奕), disappeared from the military's radar at 3:23 p.m. on Jan. 11, 2022, about 30 minutes after it took off from Chiayi Air Base on a routine training mission with another aircraft.

The F-16V had just completed a series of simulated missile launches when it 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.

An ad hoc team was subsequently assembled to investigate the cause of the crash, but their findings have not yet been released by the Air Force.

(By Matt Yu and Joseph Yeh)

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