I hope they do not retire the A-10.

The F-35 can not duplicate it.

It's cheaper to operate and much more survivable.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/21/politi...sis/index.html

I hope they don't either but there are good and valid reasons to retire it that have nothing to do the POS F35.

It would be a real shame if we didn't have such great tools to kill people half the world over.

the A10 was ( is) a great plane but is is OLD , very old

it really is in need of being replaced with a 2015+ version OF the A-10

the garbage that is the f35 is NOT a a10 replacement

I agree it is old.

But there is not any plane around that can sustain the kind of damage an A-10 can take.

http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.co.../story0016.htm

Old does not necessarily mean outdated.

It is also much cheaper to maintain than most other jets.

The problem is we can't get parts for it.

The A10 and the AC130 are my personal favorite aircraft

I've heard of A4 but I didn't know it went up to A10! It must be huge. How could you fit A10 into your printer?
jdk

with care

just the ammo for the gun is 30mm x 173mm
and fires 4200 rounds per minute

You left out...

And uses depleted uranium. :-)

And scares the bejeezus out of the enemy

So as not to lose it, A10 paper being 37mm x 26mm (http://www.papersizes.org/a-paper-sizes.htm), quite a bit smaller than... And I like the way the flying A10 carries a humungous amount of stuff under the wings (for when the gun goes quiet).

I question the accuracy of the survivability (sp?) comment. The A-10 was used back when I was in the service in the late 1970s, and was used long before that. It is vulnerable against hand-held surface-to-air missles, which everyone has these days. Small drones with machine guns, operated at the company level, is what I would use. Put up five or six of those and have at 'em.

No it wasn't it was introduced into service in '77 it's a post Vietnam aircraft. It filled the role the A 1 played in Vietnam, it's a craft that hasn't been made since the mid '80's and needs a replacement that is as capable.

Perhaps Fixit7 was loosely using the term "survivability" in reference to the relative not only tried-and-true nature of the A10 (which also has some advantage in being very tightly focused specifically use designed as opposed to the F35 which was hoped to have much wider application - think Sybil levels of multiple personality syndrome) but also it's use of discrete components that make upgrade options more numerous and possible than the highly integrated nature of the F35, whose problems began very early in design stages before one was even built, massively above budget and a sinkhole ever since.. The entire history of the F35 just screams "boondoggle" and is possibly the most universally hated military plane ever conceived. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the date of 2017 for A10 retirement was pushed ahead a few years until other options might become possible, somewhat similar to how Grumman's Tomcat was upgraded and utilized long past it's expected time of service. It just worked.

I knew several pilots in the Virginia Beach area who had very mixed feelings about the Tomcat's retirement date who while certainly concerned with how "long in the tooth" it was and excitedly looking forward to advanced technology, but had deep concerns that any replacement would or even could measure up to the overall confidence earned by the Tomcat. Apparently and thankfully some high level "shot callers" actually listen to pilots and crew. It would come as quite a surprise to me that the F35 can ever recover from it's myriad problems and ever become a reliable option, at the very least for very long. A10 is respected for good reasons and the F35 is equally supported by good reasons but to retire quietly and ASAP. It has certainly been an albatross around Lockheed Martin's neck for far too long.

Movieman99 may be on to something according to F35 vs/ Dones and this article is just a sample of like-minded opinion all over.


Edit - UPDATE --- Indefinite hold

That's an exaggeration.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messer...t_Me_163_Komet