Boeing is preparing its St. Louis F-15 factory for an order of 80 of the almost-50-year-old-design jets from the U.S. Air Force. The order is tucked into the Defense Department’s most recent appropriations request and Boeing says it wants to be ready if the Air Force needs the big twin fighters sooner rather than later. “With all the improvements we’ve done to the F-15 over the years, there’s more interest in the F-15,” Andy Stark, manager of F-15 assembly, told The Associated Press. “We’d rather get ahead of the need versus waiting for the need to happen. So we’re doing these studies so that way when the need occurs we’ve already got the business case and we’re ready to pull the trigger.”
The St. Louis plant has been kept busy supplying orders from foreign military powers for the tried and true Eagle, which now bristles with modern features and weapons capabilities. Singapore, South Korea and Saudi Arabia continue to take deliveries. The factory is now building about one fighter a month but Boeing is looking at tripling that for the USAF order. The F-15 order proposal has annoyed politicians in states that build components for the F-35, which is assembled by Lockheed Martin in Fort Worth.
