Maintenance cost for F-15K soars 10-fold over 4 years

Maintenance cost for F-15K soars 10-fold over 4 years

F-15K fighter jet By Lee Tae-hoon The maintenance cost for Korea’s F-15Ks has jumped nearly 10-fold over the past four years, becoming a financial burden to the nation’s defense budget, multiple sources said Monday. Seoul has purchased 60 of the high-end multirole aircraft from American aerospace giant Boeing since 2002. It took delivery of 40 by 2008 and 13 more as of the end of 2011. An F-15K crashed during a night training flight in June 2006 off the east coast, raising doubts over the reliability of the aircraft. “We only had to spend 9.7 billion won ($8.61 million) to maintain an operational rate of 82 percent for the 40 F-15Ks in 2008,” a senior Air Force official said on condition of anonymity. “However, the maintenance cost for the jets jumped to 39 billion won in 2009, 82.28 billion won in 2010, and 95.82 billion won in 2011.” Rep. Song Young-sun of the governing Saenuri Party noted that despite the surge in maintenance costs, the low operational rate of the F-15Ks has hardly improved over the past several years. She said the rate rose to 83 percent in 2009 and 86 percent in 2010 before dropping to 84 percent in the first half of 2011 due largely to constant delays in the supply of spare parts from Boeing. The Air Force official pointed out that it was no surprise to hear that the annual maintenance cost has begun to exceed 90 billion won, which is about the price of a new jet. “Boeing officials estimate that keeping an F-15K or another fighter jet for 20 years would cost 2.3 times the cost of the actual aircraft,” he said. The unit cost for the first lot of 40 F-15K airframes and engines (fly away cost) was 75.3 billion won ($84.4 million). This rose to 87.66 billion won for the second lot of 20, according to a classified National Assembly document. Another ranking military official said the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) will sign a performance based logistics (PBL) deal worth $310 million with Boeing as early as by the end of the month to curb the snowballing maintenance cost. If signed, Boeing will guarantee supply of some 948 key components, which excludes engines and some spare parts, within a day and an 85 percent operational rate for F-15Ks for the next five years. “We believe Korea will be able to save at least $100 million in maintenance of the F-15Ks through the PBL, while maintaining a higher operational readiness,” he said. Under the PBL, he said, Korea would provide a maximum of 1 percent of the PBL cost as a financial incentive if Boeing exceeds the mutually agreed expectations. The U.S. company will pay back up to 4 percent of the cost as a penalty for poor performance. Beside the PBL budget, Korea has set aside another 86.6 billion won for the supply of non-PBL components for F-15Ks for 2012. The Assembly approved a separate budget of 68 billion won for the acquisition of spares parts for electronic warfare systems in 2009, but DAPA has yet to spend the money due to difficulties in signing agreements.