Aircraft

With bids for the US Army/Air Force Joint Cargo Aircraft (JCA) programme to be submitted in mid-May, the Raytheon/EADS Casa Team JCA has chosen Mobile, Alabama as the final-assembly site for CN-235 and C-295 transports sold into North America.

The final-assembly site will be located at Mobile Regional airport, where EADS Casa has already established a customer service and training centre for maritime-patrol CN-235s being delivered under the US Coast Guard’s Deepwater programme.

EADS is also building an Airbus engineering centre at Mobile’s Brookley Field downtown airport, which is the site selected by Northrop Grumman and EADS North America for a proposed KC-30 tanker production facility.

A completion and delivery centre for CN-235s and C-295s sold in North America will be established in Mobile, regardless of whether the Raytheon/EADS team wins the JCA competition, with construction beginning in the second quarter.

The team is also competing for a Canadian search-and-rescue requirement.

If Team JCA wins the potentially 145-aircraft contract, both programme management and final assembly will be located in Mobile, according to EADS North America chairman and chief executive Ralph Crosby.

The Alenia Aeronautica/L-3 Communications team offering the C-27J Spartan for JCA plans to issue a request for proposals to a shortlist of US states and select a final-assembly site before 17 May, when bids for the transport-aircraft programme are to be submitted.