The picture from the successful firing:

It’s the nbr B301, a dedicted test aircraft.

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If the Qatari have ordered this config (SATCOM + Meteor), it will certainly launch a new arm race in the region. I wonder if the Met would gain approval from the partner nations?

Source:
http://www.air-cosmos.com/

Quatar about to Order 24 Rafale + 12 Options to MDBA – 6.5B$ deal Confirmed by Fr Gov

The contract between the State of Qatar and Dassault Aviation is to be signed on Monday, May 4 in Doha in the presence of Mr. François Hollande, President of the French Republic.

Following on from the Mirage F1, the Alpha Jet and the Mirage 2000, the Rafale is set to extend the historic partnership between Qatar, France and Dassault Aviation.

Source:
http://www.stockhouse.com/

There are studies (British and American, by obvious reasons) on the open about the costs of operating aircrafts on main bases versus V/STOL operations on dispersed sites, this last option, by comparison, is a bit (quite) expensive (and more survivable if WWIII had hit the proverbial “fan”). The manpower (and multiple related problems of maintenance, housekeeping, logistic support, command and control, and security) needed to operate in dispersed sites its a bit daunting (an example, think on the archetypal problem of delivering fuel to the sqn´s, in a mainbase thats done by a pipe, on dispersed sites thats either by truck or helicopter).
Offcourse that you can operate V/STOL aircrafts from a mainbase, but in that case, there´s no reason for paying a premium for that particular capability (and the F-35B unit cost is, well, on the “premium” side of things).
And i would imagine that the Swiss tax payer is not inclined to pay premium´s for fighter jets.

Cheers

Hi Sintra,

I understand your arguments but those doesn’t take in account two main variables:
– the revolution in Maintenance (modular design/ Automatic diagnostic and Offset analysis/repair + preventive maintenance (when it works)).
– The high cost of operating inside a deeply buried/NBC protected cavern. You need trained personnel, specific maintenance, expensive tooling and parts etc…

Last but not least, operating deep in the valley where man can found the only place to lie an airstrip, aggravates the noise pollution. By switching to STOVL on the surrounding plateau, you decrease drastically the nuisance level for your taxpayer (main population center are in the valleys).

Also, Switzerland is an old country with an extensive networks of roads and liaisons. The Cold War era has even disseminated a lot of dispersed shelter, artillery position and paved spots all over the country that could be re-used to sustain STOVL operation.

In that vision, sustained OP would use hardened shelters only as depot and deep maintenance routing parts and fuel via automatic airlifted deliveries (Kamov style) and roads. You’ll then have minimal footprint at STOVL base, fast relocation capabilities to increase resiliance and the Stealth characteristic of the F35 will augment the resilience of the overall system by hiding the landing location during approach and transit.

~S

No. It’s a budget because you won’t need to sustain as much expensive war hardened airbase deep into the mountain with Billon $ needs in personnel, maintenance and consumable.

You switch all that for a bunch of tents and a campfire 😉

Fantastic piloting skills. Great job from the crew. Note how the plane stay aligned with the runway until speed fall down to a low value.

Now, all the experts will urge the ICAO to give back the controls to the pilots.

Note:
I wonder why the construction workers that can be seen on the lower left portion at the end of the video were not instructed to leave the crash zone.

Source:
http://aviation-safety.net/
Youtube.com

there nothing like any airbase the sites are made from roads and shelters cut out of the hill side

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yes I was wondering the same last week but cldn’t found any dimensions regarding height of the cavern shelters.

So looking at available height only, we would have to ruled out most aircraft equipped with a the single vertical tail. I don’t know if my memory stand right but I have in mind that the main competitor against the F18 at the time vowed to take in charge the modification of the tunnel.

I never heard something similar in the first deal from any of the different competitor. So perhaps the Air force did take care of that. Otherwise that will make a strong point for the 35 (and the 18E/F) aside of the small Gripen.

Regarding the supposedly A2A dedicated airforce, this absolutely not true for Switzerland. One of the main pilar of the Swiss AF doctrine is to provide Air support to every node of ground defense in the country (war of attrition as a deterrence). Credible Strike capabilities are fundamentals there.

We have alrdy discussed extensively around all those point, but I think the 35B could be a winner for the AF helping to cut the overall cost of operating an Airforce simply by downsizing the foot print of its infrastructures without affecting any of its capabilities*. It could also help to keep nuisances away from the citizen, what could be the ultimate argument during a votation…

So much that the next Motto of the air force could be: Sleep Tight 😉

*let’s be realistic, a Mach 2 intercept above Switzerland territory does not bought any more time than one at Mach 1.6 – Switzerland is not India

Sorry but what does the picture show?