No joke, probably a lot of truth to this. My father is a fluid mechanics engineer and some of the things he designs in autocad and other programs
literally take up terrabytes of space.
I am sure something as complicated as a F-35 is mind boggling when it comes to storage space for specs etc.
well we (The UK) did want all the tech specs of the JSF. Two weeks later. We give the data back but it is now a finished aircraft. It doesn't weight
too much and it has fire equipment.