PAS 2025 – Eurofighter’s future
EDR On-Line met Eurofighter’s recently appointed Spanish CEO, Jorge Tamarit Degenhardt at the Paris Air Show, who detailed the future of the European combat aircraft
He underlined that the rapidly changing world with new conflicts is a wakeup call for Europe and a tipping point for Eurofighter. Today 80 percent of combat mission in Europe are flown by Eurofighters which has achieved on million flight hours this year, Degenhardt said. A total of 729 are on order with 612 delivered, but Eurofighter target is to increase delivery. Currently its industrial partners Airbus Defence & Space, BAE Systems and Leonardo are in the process of increasing their combined annual production of the Eurofighter from 14 aircraft to 20, with a target 30 depending on future orders.
Time to market for any new customer would by 50 months. With new aircraft in production for Spain, Italy, and Germany, according to Degenhardt, Eurofighter is targeting Austria, Greece, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, amongst others with the prospect of more than 100 aircraft. The CEO stated that the Saudi order is a must for the UK, which is also leading the Turkish campaign although there may be outstanding problems from the German government to be addressed.
With Eurofighter being designed to fly to the 2060s, a mid-life upgrade (MLU) programme is being devised by the industrial partners, which would see the upgrade of avionics, electronic warfare (EW) capability and weapons systems. Eurofighters will also be used to test new next generation technologies for GCAP, some of which could be introduced in their MLU.
This month (June) the UK MoD announced an investment of £ 204.6 million that will go towards the production and integration of the new ECRS Mk2 radar developed by Leonardo for Royal Air Force Eurofighters following successful flight trials which concluded earlier this year.
Gorge Tamarit Degenhardt stressed that the upgraded Eurofighter’s combat capability will compliment it to GCAP and FCAS.
Photo courtesy Eurofighter
