Hog Drops Laser JDAM

A test team led by the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin AFB, Fla., performed the first test drop of the new Laser Joint Direct Attack Munition by an A-10 Warthog earlier this month, according to a Nov. 14 Eglin release. “The test was very successful,” said Capt. Kirk Cassell, lead A-10C flight test engineer. The Air Force tested use of the Boeing-built LJDAM with a B-52 bomber earlier this fall, and the service employed the new munition, introduced in the Air Force inventory just this year, in combat for the first time on Aug. 12 when an F-16 fired it against a moving target in Iraq. The test team had to work faster than normal, said Cassell, because Air Combat Command wanted to add the LJDAM to the A-10C for an upcoming deployment. The pilot on the test flight, Maj. Matthew Domsalla, who has flown Hogs for eight years, noted that the LJDAM enables the pilot to “update the targeting if the target moves while the weapon is in flight.” (Eglin report by MSgt. Joy Josephson)