Military Aviation News Archive
10/06/2012
U.S. military flight tests have shown how drones could handle midair refueling by themselves, without human pilots. That raises the possibility of automated "flying gas stations" topping off robotic aircraft over future battlefields.
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10/06/2012
The Department of Defense issued the following ministerial media release:
Minister for Defence Stephen Smith and Minister for Defence Materiel Jason Clare today welcomed three United States Navy (USN) EA-18G Growler aircraft to RAAF Base Amberley.
In August, the Government announced that it had decided to acquire the Growler electronic warfare capability for the Super Hornet at a cost of around $1.5 billion.
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10/06/2012
The IAF is all set to raise four more squadrons of Su-30 MKI fighter in the near future as it prepares to induct the tenth unit of the aircraft in Punjab along the Pakistan border. Codenamed 'Flying Lancers', the process to set up the new Number-15 squadron will be initiated in December and will be fully operational by middle of the next year, Air Chief Marshal N A K Browne said.
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10/06/2012
Dassault and Thales announced delivery of the first production Rafale to carry the Thales RBE2 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. The companies noted that the aircraft, production number C137 for the French Air Force, is the first AESA-equipped European combat aircraft to enter service. The development was completed on time and budget, they added.
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10/06/2012
JSC Irkut Corporation has handed over the first batch of six Yak-130 combat trainers to the Russian Air Force. Pilots of Borisoglebsk training center completed transported the three aircraft from Irkutsk aviation plant to the base aerodrome in Borisoglebsk city. According to the terms of the contract signed in 2011, the Russian AIr Force will recieve 55 Yak-130 combat trainers delivery by 2015.
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10/06/2012
Russian and Central Asian military pilots are carrying out joint exercises to repel missile strikes over Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, Russian Defense Ministry Air Force spokesman Lt. Col. Vladimir Deryabin said on Friday. The Clear Sky 2012 military exercises get underway on Friday and run through October 16, with planned scenarios including intercepting cruise missile attack.
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10/06/2012
The U.S. Army has awarded Boeing a five-year Performance-Based Logistics (PBL) contract for CH-47 Chinook support, an arrangement that reduces customer costs while allowing Boeing to invest in improving products and processes. The $185 million contract covers management of the production, overhaul and distribution of the Army's supply of Chinook helicopter rotor blades.
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10/05/2012
Russia snubbed India as it postponed Russian Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov's visit to New Delhi as the dates are clashing with Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani's visit to Moscow starting from October 5.Apparently, Moscow has conveyed to New Delhi that the meeting of annual India-Russia Inter-Governmental Commission on Military Technical Cooperation (IRIGC-MTC), which was to be held on Thursday.
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10/05/2012
Saab's Gripen F test aircraft touched down in Emmen, Switzerland, on 3 October, as part of a campaign to sell 22 of the new-generation combat aircraft to the nation's air force. Accompanied on its 2h journey from Linköping in Sweden by a twin-seat Gripen D, the next-generation development aircraft will remain in Switzerland for 10 days. During this time it will be shown to personnel from the nation's defence committees and also appear at the Axalp air show on 10-11 October.
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10/05/2012
Pilots, maintainers and analysts from the Republic of Korea Army, Test and Evaluation Group, and the Boeing Company received guided tours and operational briefings from the 3rd Battalion, 101st Aviation Regiment, 159th Combat Aviation Brigade, Sept. 24-25. The South Korean government is currently looking at several attack helicopter platforms for purchase that would improve their ability to meet current and future threats in the Pacific region.
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10/05/2012
Military aircraft manufacturer Dassault Aviation is upping the ante in Malaysia with the hopes of supplying its combat aircraft Rafale to the Government, which considering to retire the ageing fleet of Russian made MIG-29N under the Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MRCA) programme.
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10/05/2012
Six of the RAAF's now retired F-111 strike bombers, affectionately referred to as "pigs", are set to go on display at aircraft museums and historical organisations across Australia. Defence Materiel Minister Jason Clare said these aircraft, which retired in 2010, would be loaned out to help preserve an important part of Australia's military heritage.
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10/05/2012
Russia’s Irkut aircraft-manufacturing plant delivered the first six Yakovlev Yak-130 Mitten combat trainers to the Russian Air Force on Thursday, a spokesman for the Western Military District said. “On October 4, the first batch of Yak-130 combat trainers fly from the Irkut plant to the Borisoglebsk airfield [Voronezh region] after an extensive flight testing program,” Col. Andrei Bobrun said.
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10/05/2012
Russia's Defense Ministry on Thursday signed a contract worth about 140 billion rubles ($4 billion) to buy 39 IL-476 transport planes, President Vladimir Putin announced. "This is the first, essentially new plane, that Russia's aviation industry has produced in the past 21 years" President Putin said "I am confident that this plane will enjoy great demand here, and among our possible partners abroad."
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10/04/2012
The Taliban have claimed credit for the downing of a NATO helicopter but international forces denied the allegation. The NATO Boeing CH-47D Chinook twin-engine, tandem rotor heavy-lift military transport helicopter crashed Monday Zabul province in southern Afghanistan. The Taliban stated that, in addition to downing the helicopter, all aboard were killed.
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10/04/2012
Years before F-22 pilots began getting dizzy in the cockpit, before one struggled to breathe as he tried to pull out of a fatal crash, before two more went on television to say the plane was so unsafe they refused to fly it, a small circle of Air Force experts knew something was wrong with the prized stealth fighter jet.
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10/04/2012
The Syrian government's army has been driven out of many areas in this province, a stronghold of the opposition forces arrayed against Syrian leader Bashar Assad. Even so, it would be a mistake to call this a liberated zone. Unable to make much headway on the ground, the Syrian air force is hitting back with increasing ferocity, dropping bombs from planes and helicopters and chasing the civilians who are trying to get out of the war.
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10/04/2012
On Tuesday, two Saudi F-15 fighter planes intercepted “an unidentified aircraft coming from the Horn of Africa [and] flying at a low level,” according to Saudi Arabian Arabic website, Jazan News. The Saudi website didn’t mention its sources and did not provide additional details but said the authorities will treat the matter as “the situation requires.”
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10/04/2012
A Taiwanese pilot died yesterday morning after his Mirage 2000-5F crashed in France. The pilot, identified as Wang Tung-yi was on a training exchange program at the BA 116 airforce base in Luxeuil-les-Bains, Haute-Saone, and his aircraft crashed north of Luxeuil, near the Froideconche community soon after takeoff at 10:05am, French military officials told media.
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10/04/2012
The Army is refining an initial capabilities document for a new fixed-wing utility aircraft that is designed to replace more than 112 airframes with a common platform. The new platform should be able to perform a range of key mission sets and services, officials said.
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10/03/2012
Dassault and its industry partners on the Rafale combat aircraft have achieved a significant programme milestone with the delivery of the first production example to feature an active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. Handed over to France's DGA defence procurement agency at Dassault's Merignac assembly site on 2 October, single-seat aircraft C137 will enter French air force service with the Thales RBE2 radar.
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10/03/2012
Concerned over recurring problems in MiG-27 combat aircraft engines, Indian Air Force is planning to phase out these Russian-origin planes by 2017. IAF operates about 80 (four squadrons) of these aircraft in its fleet and due to the recurring problems in their engines, it had to ground all of them after a crash about two years ago.
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10/03/2012
Israel and China have been renewing military ties in recent months after a lengthy chill caused by hefty Israeli arms deals that the United States shot down. The upswing in relations between the defense establishments has raised eyebrows in Washington, which views China's expansion in the Pacific with growing concern. Israel once seemed set to be a major arms supplier to China.
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10/03/2012
In a joint venture between Russia and Ukraine, the An-70 military transport aircraft has been flight tested after two years in development. The An-70 is certain to add to the competition between heavy airlift aircraft such as the C-130J Super Hercules and A400M aircraft. The An-70 can carry 47 tons for 1350 kilometers while C130J can take up 20 tons and the A400M with 37 tons.
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10/03/2012
Tactical Air Defense Services, Inc., an aerospace/defense services contractor that offers tactical aviation services, aircraft maintenance, and other aerospace/defense services to the United States and Foreign militaries, is pleased to announce that it has closed the acquisition of Northrop TF5-1 Corp. ("Northrop"), a military aircraft holding company, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of TADF.
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