11 Months After Successful Flight of Unit 1 in July Last Year
Defense Acquisition Program Administration: "Verifying Armed Capabilities... Utilizing All Six Units"
The sixth and final prototype of the domestically produced supersonic fighter jet 'Boramae' KF-21 has successfully completed its maiden flight. This comes 11 months after the first prototype's initial flight in July last year.
The Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) announced that the sixth KF-21 prototype took off from the runway of the Air Force's 3rd Training Flight Group in Sacheon, Gyeongnam, at around 3:49 PM on the 28th, flew for 33 minutes, and landed at approximately 4:22 PM. With this, all six KF-21 prototypes have successfully flown. In the two-seat (tandem) sixth prototype, Major Lee Cheolsu of the Air Force's 52nd Test and Evaluation Squadron was seated in the front cockpit, and KAI senior test pilot Ko Hwiseok was in the rear.
The sixth prototype, which succeeded in its first test flight that day, will undergo various tests similar to the previous prototypes, including flight stability, flight envelope expansion, verification of avionics performance including the Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar, and weapons testing.
The sixth prototype was painted with a dark camouflage pattern on the fuselage and tail fins to distinguish it from the other prototypes. The military authorities plan to select the paint scheme to be applied to the mass-produced fighter jets by considering camouflage capabilities during combat situations among the six differently painted prototypes.
DAPA explained that with the successful test flight of the sixth prototype, the KF-21 system development can proceed successfully according to the existing schedule. After consultations with related ministries such as the Ministry of Economy and Finance, DAPA plans to conduct a feasibility study on the KF-21 mass production project by August and aims to obtain approval for the mass production plan by December this year. The goal is to start mass production next year and achieve operational deployment in the latter half of 2026.
The KF-21 is a '4.5-generation' fighter jet jointly developed by Korea and Indonesia under the leadership of KAI. Korea is the eighth country worldwide to successfully develop a 4.5-generation or higher supersonic fighter jet, following the United States, Russia, China, Japan, France, and others. After the first prototype's maiden flight in July last year, the KF-21 achieved its first supersonic flight in January this year. In March, it successfully completed tests for AESA radar installation, air-to-air weapon separation, and aerial gun firing. Last month, it obtained the 'provisional combat suitability' certification six months ahead of schedule.
A DAPA official stated, "We will continue flight tests using all six prototypes to verify capabilities such as supersonic flight, advanced avionics and electronic warfare equipment, and air-to-air weapons. After analyzing the results, we will reflect improvements in the development process and do our best to ensure the successful development of the Korean fighter jet that will protect our future airspace."
Meanwhile, Indonesia, the joint development partner, has reportedly not yet presented a plan to pay the overdue contributions. Indonesia agreed to bear about 20% of the total development cost of 8.8 trillion won, approximately 1.7 trillion won, by 2026, in exchange for receiving one prototype (the fifth) and various technical data, and to produce 48 next-generation fighters locally. However, after paying only 227.2 billion won by January 2019, Indonesia did not pay contributions for nearly four years citing budget shortages, only adding 9.4 billion won in November last year and 41.7 billion won in February this year. Compared to the original plan, about 800 billion won remains overdue.
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