OREANDA-NEWS. Air Force pilot of the Chkalov Flight Test Center made a PAK FA test flight for the first time. The plane took off the airfield of the M.M.Gromov Flight Research Institute in the city of Zhukovsky (Moscow region). The system and equipment testing went on for two hours in accordance with the flight test program. The flight was a success, in full conformity with the flight mission.

Presently four planes undergo flight tests. Two more aircraft are engaged in ground experimental missions — one plane is a complex ground test stand and the other undergoes static tests. The fifth PAK FA aircraft will join the flight test program in the second half of 2013. Construction of that plane at the Sukhoi’s aircraft plant — Y.A.Gagarin KnAAZ in Komsomolsk-on-Amur is almost complete.