Within weeks of declaring the F-35 combat ready another news has come in which is sure gonna be the cherry on top for the United States Air Force. The KC-46 Pegasus aerial refueling tanker has been cleared for production after numerous delays. The Boeing KC-46 intends to replace the cold war era KC-135 Stratotanker the mainstay for the USAF. After the KC-46 Pegasus got selected as the preferred bidder for the KC-X program the project got riddled with numerous problems and delays with the main issue being the boom of the KC-46 not able to deliver fuel to heavier aircraft like the C-17 . The problems so far has been bypassed but it led to a delay in the tests where the pegasus has to prove itself that it can refuel aircraft like F-18,F-16 ,AV-8 etc. This caused the delay for the delivery of the first 18 aircraft to the Air Force . Dates were pushed back from August 2017 to January 2018. So far the KC-46 has found little international success receiving orders only from the Japanese Self Air Defense Force (JSDAF).
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