When Navy test pilot Lt. Christopher Tabert completed the government acceptance flight for a production F-35A Lightning II (Air Force serial number 09-5001) for the US Air Force at the Lockheed Martin facility in Fort Worth, Texas, on 23 March 2012, he became the first military test pilot to fly the conventional takeoff and landing A-model, the short takeoff/vertical landing B-model, and carrier variant C-model of the F-35. Tabert has recorded a number of F-35 test milestones: the first steam catapult launch; the first weapons pit drop for an inert 1,000 pound GBU-32 GPS-guided bomb; a supersonic flight; and the first launch from the Navy’s Electromagnetic Aircraft Launching System, or EMALS.
