Lockheed Martin chose the Paris Air Show to celebrate a 'year of firsts' for its F-35 Lighting II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) programme, which will culminate in an F-35B short take-off/vertical landing (STOVL) variant making its first landing by the end of September.rnOther milestones achieved by the programme so far in 2009 have included the rollout on 21 January of the first F-35 equipped with mission systems (aircraft BF-4), which will lead to the first in-flight avionics testing this summer; the first flight of the second F-35B on 25 February; and the first US Marine to pilot an F-35, which took place on 19March. With the JSF programme coming in for some degree of criticism in recent months - from doubts about the aircraft's ultimate performance to questions raised over the degree of risk in an aggressive production schedule - Lockheed Martin took the opportunity at Le Bourgetto celebrate the 'long-range commitments' made recently by its international partners: the UK, Italy, the Netherlands, Turkey, Canada, Australia, Denmark and Norway.
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