Air Transportation: October 8, 2002

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Lockheed Martin is proposing an entirely new kind of aircraft that could replace the V-22 for long-range deep-penetration covert landing missions. The idea would be to use the power train from the Marine Corps vertical-landing F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to design an assault transport aircraft  (V-35?). Such an aircraft would use the power of a fighter plane to push a larger and less maneuverable airframe cable to carry a dozen or more passengers at speeds double those of the V-22 (and four times that of a helicopter) but still land on a dime.--Stephen V Cole