AirForces Monthly Magazine

New ‘jump platform’ for RAF Falcons

22nd May 2025

DORNIER Do228 C-FPSH arrived at RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, direct from Canada on May 20. The RAF Falcons parachute display team will use the aircraft for the 2017 season. The Falcons use a variety of aircraft as jump platforms, depending on aircraft availability and the nature of the display. These include the Chinook, Hercules, Puma […]

Voyager at Mildenhall

22nd May 2025

Photographed on finals to Runway 11 at RAF Mildenhall, Royal Air Force Voyager KC3 ZZ332 made a first visit to the Suff olk base on May 10. Operated by No 10 Squadron at RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, the Voyager (A330-243MRTT) was using the callsign ‘Madras 31’. The Voyager was at Mildenhall for the 2017 European […]

DHFS AW139 at Newquay

22nd May 2025

DEFENCE HELICOPTER Flying School (DHFS) AW139 ZR283 (c/n 31283) arrived at Newquay Airport, Cornwall, on April 24. Cobham Aviation Services has taken over the old No 203 Squadron hangar at Newquay and it is believed they will conduct helicopter training from the airport. The three AW139s of the RAF’s Search and Rescue Training Unit (SARTU) […]

Evacuation exercise in Salzburg

22nd May 2025

The Luftstreitkräfte’s venerable Alouette IIIs, including 3E-KK (c/n 1547) of the Hubschraubergeschwader (Helicopter Wing), played a role in the exercise. Robert Erenstein THE FEDERAL Armed Forces of Austria, together with public and private emergency services, staged the country’s largest evacuation exercise of the year in the Federal State of Salzburg on May 19. The community […]

Heavy load for Typhoon IPA7

22nd May 2025

First flown on January 16, 2008 as the initial series aircraft completed to the Tranche 2 standard, IPA7 was the first German EF2000 to incorporate Block 8 software. It’s used as a test aircraft for future configurations and equipment. Dietmar Fenners EUROFIGHTER TYPHOON Instrumented Production Aircraft (IPA) 7 has flown for the first time at […]

Anniversary Transall for LTG 61

22nd May 2025

Using the callsign ‘GAF 910’, C-160D 51+01 from LTG 61 arrives at Cologne-Bonn on May 23. Oliver Jonischkeit THE Luftwaffe’s Lufttransportgeschwader 61 (LTG 61, Air Transport Wing 61), based at Landsberg, has unveiled a special scheme to mark the wing’s 60th anniversary. Silver-painted C-160D 51+01 made its official debut on May 22, and the following […]

‘Stingers’ Squadron centenary

22nd May 2025

F-16AM FA-132 flew for the first time in its new scheme on May 12. The unit’s current callsign is ‘Stinger’ Jos Schoofs BELGIAN AIR Component F-16AM FA-132 has adopted a commemorative colour scheme to celebrate the centenary of the 1st Squadron’s Scottish thistle insignia. The 1st Squadron of the Belgian Vliegerscompagnie/ Compagnie d’Aviateurs was created […]

31 Squadron’s ‘Tiger’ for 2017

22nd May 2025

A special colour scheme has been unveiled for F-16AM FA-94, with which the Belgian Air Component’s 31 ‘Tiger’ Squadron will participate in this year’s NATO ‘Tiger Meet’. Designed by ‘Vrieske’, a 31 Squadron pilot, the scheme has been named ‘Les Pirates Embarqués’, a reference to this year’s organiser of the Tiger Meet: Landivisiau-based Flottille 11F […]

30th anniversary of Belgian F-16 OCU

22nd May 2025

F-16BM FB-24 in special colours to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the creation of the F-16 OCU as a full-size squadron. Benoît Denet WHEN BELGIUM decided to replace the Mirage 5s of the 2nd Tactical Wing at Florennes with 44 F-16s, its air force replaced the previous F-16 Conversion Flight with the Operational Conversion Unit […]

New pod for Dutch NH90

22nd May 2025

ROYAL NETHERLANDS Air Force (RNLAF) NH90 NFH N-325 was spotted at De Kooij on May 9 carrying a previously unseen sensor pod on a large fuselage-mounted rack. The equipment appears to be non-operational, with parts painted orange and primer yellow for test duties. The unknown store appears similar to the TERMA-built Apache Modular Aircraft Survivability […]

Latest Spanish Tigre HAD under test

22nd May 2025

ET-719 taxies to the active runway at Albacete for a 90-minute test flight on May 4. Note the 68mm rocket pod and external fuel tank under the port wing. Roberto Yáñez THE THIRTEENTH Ejército de Tierra (ET, Spanish Army) Tigre HAD began flight-testing at the Airbus Helicopters factory in Albacete, Spain, at the end of […]

Swiss ‘fighting duck’ F-5E

22nd May 2025

The Schweizer Luftwaff e’s (Swiss Air Force’s) Fliegerstaff el 6 (Flying Squadron 6) based at Payerne painted F-5E J-3033 in a scheme marking the final Wiederholungskurs (repetition course), which took place at the base in May. The squadron crest shows a marching duck in armour and the unit uses the callsign ‘Duck’.

France’s first PC-21 breaks cover

22nd May 2025

The first PC-21 for the French Air Force is towed across the airfield at Stans on May 18. Stephan Widmer PILATUS AIRCRAFT is nearing completion of the first PC-21 for the French Air Force. The incomplete aircraft, ‘01’ (c/n 293), was noted outside the factory at Stans-Buochs, Switzerland, on May 18 when it was towed […]

Fiscal Year 2018 budget proposal

22nd May 2025

The FY 2018 budget proposal includes a slight increase in the planned buy of F-35As for the US Air Force, to 46. Among the latest to take to the air is 15-5126/‘HL’ (AF-117), which made its first flight at Fort Worth on May 4. Carl Richards PRESIDENT Trump unveiled his first budget proposal for the […]

Pegasus refuels from Stratotanker

22nd May 2025

USAF/TSgt Kat Justen OPERATED BY the US Navy’s Air Test and Evaluation Squadron (VX) 1, P-8A BuNo 168956 approaches the refuelling boom of a KC-135R operated by the Air Force Reserve Command’s 459th Air Refueling Wing over the Atlantic Ocean on April 13 – the first time the Pegasus had been refuelled by a Stratotanker […]

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