Aircraft
KnAAPO starts work on fifth-gen fighter
Sukhoi’s Komsomolsk-on-Amur Aviation Industrial Association (KnAAPO) has started manufacturing the first development prototypes of an advanced fifth-genera

Sukhoi’s Komsomolsk-on-Amur Aviation Industrial Association (KnAAPO) has started manufacturing the first development prototypes of an advanced fifth-generation fighter. Sukhoi told AIN that it will complete an experimental aircraft in the second half of next year, after which it will start flight trials.

According to Sukhoi director general Mikhail Pogosyan, the first test aircraft is roughly 30 percent complete. “The exact manufacturing time frame normally varies from seven to ten years,” he explained. “We have done more than a third of the job and are building a development prototype, which will take us several years. We shall gradually increase the operational capabilities of the aircraft and will start production in 2015.”