Current Issue March 2014 magazine cover  Save 47% off the cover
price!   The Raptor Arrives   Compared with their neighbors,
which bristle with weapons, the Rap-tors look neutered; their
weapons bays are internal, so the airplanes generate a much
smaller radar signature. The Raptors’ stealthy shape sends most
of a radar return away from the signal’s source. The cleaner
airframe also produces relatively little drag.  The Tyndall
pilots’ training syllabus lasts 60 days. Cabral tells me that
the first 21 days were all academic. He had to sit through 57
hours of classes (including five tests), plus 16 hours in the
simulator. There are no two-seat F/A-22s, so when Cabral took
off for the first time, it really was his first Raptor flight.
The day before, he’d sat in the aircraft for the first time,
then started it up. “It’s got that new car smell,” he recalls.
“It’s louder than an [F-15] Eagle, it rumbles more, and the nose
slopes down so it feels almost like you’re falling out of the
plane.”  He had three basic “t