By Craig Hoyle in Warton
BAE Systems is to establish a new national support centre for the Royal Air Force’s Eurofighter Typhoon strike aircraft under a £100 million ($182 million) UK Ministry of Defence contract with the four-nation Eurofighter consortium.
The company, which performs final assembly of UK Typhoons at its Warton site in Lancashire, will oversee construction of a new facility at RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire, where the service has three operational squadrons totaling 30 Typhoons. Building will begin later this month and conclude in late 2008.
Once completed, the new centre will provide through-life support to RAF operations of the Typhoon, with a weapons systems support rig for validation of electronic- warfare mission data, system fault analysis and development of new avionics requirements.
“The ultimate aim is to keep the aircraft in the air with all the capability it needs to fulfil its operational role,” says Damian Halpin, BAE Typhoon integrated logistics support director. The facility will be staffed by 180 military and industry personnel, with BAE paid under a separate award.
Fergus Singleton, BAE inventory management director for the Typhoon project, says the company already provides a “hole-in-the-wall” exchange and repair service for around 800 Typhoon parts at Coningsby, and believes the new service will further boost operational readiness levels.
The UK accounts for over half of the Typhoon flight-hours logged by the four partner nations, but has purchased only one-sixth of the spare parts ordered to date, and the RAF intends to boost Typhoon operating rates by a further 25% by year-end, according to BAE.
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| Typhoons will be supported by a new facility at RAF Coningsby |
BAE is to support the RAF in increasing operating autonomy at Coningsby, with a whole-aircraft scheduled maintenance and upgrade facility to be established at the site later this decade. The company reveals, however, that the UK MoD is still assessing whether to retrofit all of its Tranche 1 production aircraft to the Tranche 2 standard due to cost concerns. Major maintenance and upgrade work on the Typhoon will continue to take place at Warton until the new line is completed at Coningsby, says Singleton.
The Eurofighter partner companies have now delivered 85 aircraft to the air forces of Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK. More than 90 additional aircraft are being built at sites across Europe, including 30 from the programme’s Tranche 2 production order and the first example for launch export customer Austria.
Source: Flight International
