“The Boeing Company [of] Jacksonville, Florida is being awarded [a] $89.1 million… contract for additional depot-level maintenance support and sustainment for the F/A-18 A/B/C/D/E/F and EA-18G aircraft,” the release stated on Friday.
The work will include High Flight Hour (HFH) inspections, modifications and liaison engineering and is due to be completed in December 2017, the Defense Department added.
Defense Secretary James Mattis ordered a comparison of the hugely expensive and controversial Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter and the F/A-18 not long after President Donald Trump was inaugurated in January.
Around the same time, Boeing, the manufacturer of the F/A-18, circulated a document suggesting that the Navy had a "significant capability gaps against emerging threats" with the F-35, according to the Navy Times, and that updating the F/A-18 was more efficient that buying new F-35 jets.
