THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Friday, January 24, 1997              TAG: 9701240531
SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A5   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                        LENGTH:   45 lines

NAVY SAYS SUPER HORNET PERFORMED BETTER THAN EXPECTED THE PLANE CAN LAND MORE SAFELY AND WITH LARGER PAYLOADS THAN THE CURRENT MODEL.

The Navy's new F/A-18F ``Super Hornet'' strike fighter put on a better-than-expected show in its initial aircraft carrier qualifications this week, the service announced Thursday, as it sent the jet home to its Maryland base a week early.

A two-seat model of the plane completed 61 catapult launches and tailhook landings in its first round of testing, which began Saturday aboard the Norfolk-based aircraft carrier John C. Stennis.

The plane, which returned to Patuxent River Naval Air Station in Maryland early Thursday, also completed 54 ``touch and go'' landings aboard the carrier.

A Navy spokesman said the Super Hornet was able to land at a slower speed and with a larger payload than the smaller Hornets now in service.

The 10-knot reduction in landing speeds makes the plane safer and easier for pilots to handle than the current Hornet, the spokesman said. Satisfying a key objective of the program, the new model also can land with a larger payload, thus preventing the current necessity of ditching unused bombs. Current Hornets that are fully armed when sent into combat but return to the ship without using any of their weapons may have to drop some bombs harmlessly into the sea before they can land safely. That's because carrier landings place extra stress on landing gears and airframes which could detonate the bombs.

The successful first round of testing for the fighter-attack jet comes as the Clinton administration and the Pentagon prepare to release a 1998 defense budget request that is expected to call for purchase of 24 Super Hornets. The planes are expected to cost more than $50 million each.

The General Accounting Office, Congress' fiscal monitoring agency, has suggested that the Super Hornet program be scrapped in favor of the purchase of more of the current models. Those planes are substantially cheaper than the Super Hornet and are almost as capable, the agency contends. ILLUSTRATION: Staff

File photo

The Navy's new F/A-18F ``Super Hornet'' strike fighter was tested on

the Norfolk-based carrier John C. Stennis.