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Aviation History
1992
1992 - 0661.PDF
NAVAL AIR REVOLUTION The capabilities of Italy's fleet air arm are to be revolutionised by the arrival of the Harrier, as Andrea Spinelli explains. As the first two Harriers (McDonnell Douglas TAV-8B trainers) landed on the deck of the Italian . aircraft carrier, Giuseppe Garibaldi in August 1991, a new era began for the country's naval aviation. Although the Italian navy has had significant experience with fixed-wing air craft — at the end of the Second World War it operated no fewer than 522 embarked and 86 land-based aircraft — later legislation forbade it to build a real fleet air arm, apart from helicopters. In February 1989, release from the post-war rules cleared the.way for the long-awaited, short take-off/ vertical-landing programme. ' 'After lengthy studies, the navy selected the Harrier II Plus, to be acquired through a tri-national procurement programme. The partners were existing Harrier operators — the US Marine Corps and Spanish navy. The project calls for 16 single-seaters and two trainers. The latter were delivered in 1991, to allow the navy to build experience and investigate the integration between the Garibaldi and the aircraft. Three single- seaters will be delivered directly from McDonnell Douglas in 1993, while the other 13 will be assembled in Italy by Alenia at the new Grottaglie plant, which is under construction. The rationale for the local assembly of such a small number of aircraft is to be found in the need to provide complete support for the operational aircraft: the tooling, personnel, and equipment to provide depot-level support is similar to that required for local assembly. The Italian navy Harriers will be the same as the USMC aircraft, with minor differences in some equipment and avionics. This means that the configuration, frozen by the three partners, will include all the improvements suggested by the USMCs AV-£ experience and its Gulf War operations. FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 18 - 24 March, 1992 27
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