Textron Aviation announced on July 20 that it has developed a maritime patrol aircraft (MPA) variant of its Cessna Model 700 Citation Longitude aircraft.

The company said that it has developed and certified factory provisions for various types of mission equipment to support maritime patrol and surveillance missions which it says maximises value for operations worldwide.

Bob Gibbs, vice president of Special Mission Sales for Textron Aviation, said: “The Cessna Citation Longitude jet provides an excellent value for special mission operations due to its acquisition cost and operation cost combined with excellent speed, range and payload capacity.”

With an eight-hour maximum endurance and 3,500nm maximum range, the Citation Longitude MPA is outfitted with a transmissive belly radome for maritime radars, beyond line of sight (BLOS) fairing, electro-optical/infra-red (EO/IR) sensor lift and optional night vision goggle (NVG) compatible lighting. Textron says that this makes it ideally suited for surveillance missions over land and water, conducting search and rescue, border patrol, fishery monitoring and more.