Turkey’s 5th-Generation Fighter Jet Kaan Successfully Completes Maiden Flight

Turkey’s fifth-generation fighter jet took its first flight on Wednesday, marking a major step forward in the country’s efforts to use warplanes made in its own country.

The Turkish Aerospace Industries and the UK’s BAE Systems worked together to make the Kaan jet. It took off from an airstrip in Ankara, the capital, and the flight, according to state station TRT, lasted just over 10 minutes.

The flight is an important event for Turkey because the government has made updating the country’s old air force a top goal. That’s become more important since the country was kicked out of the program to buy and support Lockheed Martin Corp.’s advanced F-35 fighter jets in 2019 because Ankara bought Russian S-400 air defense weapons.

Turkey is one of only a few countries working on fifth-generation aircraft as a result of this project. This means that Kaan will eventually be able to fly silently, have advanced electronics, and be able to lead troops in battle.

It’s still going to be a few years before Kaan is fully operational, and getting the engines is turning out to be the biggest problem the developers are having. As of December, Bloomberg said that Turkey was planning to make its own GE Aerospace F110 engines to serve the first phase of Kaan.