All six inboard wing pylons can carry PW2, most likely the reason they are only carrying two is to enable longer loiter time, as the RoE for use of normal PW2E is a lot tighter than PW4 or Brimstone cause of the bigger bang they make. Surprised its not carrying a couple of AMRAAMs at least, though RoE would involve a visual ID and warning, hence ASRAAM is most likely be enough to deal with any air action, however unlikely.

I often look upon the BBC as being rather reliable and credible, but, even they get stories wrong every now and then and this is just one of them. They’ve totally blown this out of all proportion & it just seems its an half-ar$ed attempt to actually look into it.

BBC News: The “headlines” they reported have just been…well, explained in a different light…The BBC have messed this up quite a bit by firstly mis-stating in the headlines; ‘Typhoon fleet grounded’, (which to anyone could mean the entire fleet), then they went on to say; ‘Typhoons are operating over Libya’ (yeees well spotted), then ‘Typhoons operating over Libya are grounded’ and they more or less stated that the Typhoon is an A/A aeroplane only, despite reporting they have been dropping bombs… :rolleyes:

An a slightly different note, The RAF, RN and British Army are fighting at least 3 conflicts these days; One in Afghanistan, one in Libya and the other against its Government.

Anyway, back to the Tiffy.

Just seen on the BBC news (I double checked) RAF Typhoon(s) taking off from Italy with a full A/A load of 4x ASRAAMs, 4x AMRAAMs, 2x drop tanks, 2x LGBs and I think there was a LDP on the centre hard point. It was hard to spot.

It took off in quite a short distance with this configuration and it looked like it done it without the use of reheat, it went near verticle very soon after it left terra firma. Nice! Its certainly not lacking any power then.

Are you sure that isn’t footage of 11 Sqn aircraft in US based Trials a couple of years back??? It is footage from the US Trials as the PW2 hanging from the Typhoon are Oxford Blue, hence are Inert Drill rounds. Photos of aircraft in Italy show 2xPW2 2xTanks and 2xASRAAM. No LDP or AMRAAM

Imagine if the Soviets had actually attacked. They’d have gotten to Brest before the first NATO aircraft had gotten off the ground.

No they wouldn’t have!!!!!!!!!!!!! The problem here is a very tight RoE, Had the big one kicked off, the RoE for the NATO Air would have been very simple….Anything Soviet North or East of a line on a map…Kill!!!!!!!

That must be one of the most inefficient cruise missile launch profiles imaginable; a 3,000 mile round-trip with regular AAR using aircraft that weren’t designed for mid-altitude cruising flight, just to launch two missiles per aircraft. Never mind the discomfort to the aircrew.

It would almost be quicker and cheaper to clear the VC-10 to carry Strom Shadows, like those 1960s Skybolt proposals! Or integrate BROACH with Tomahawk and cede the missile strike role to the RN…

Cheaper and faster than a driving a Sub driving 1500 miles to launch 7 missiles and not do much else!!

Does anyone notice this holes on f15e body ??

Could be one of the engine compressor or fans let go, and blades got though the engine casing and punched though the wing. People on the ground say that the aircraft was on fire before it crashed.

well, they were enough to do the only stealth aircraft shootdown until now (SA-6)…

the fact remains, they do the job (the rafales, I mean 😉 )

The F-117 was shot down by an SA-3, not a 6.

BBC reporting from MoD press release that RAF Tornados have already been in action, attacking with Stormshadow.

Unfortunately that logic didn’t hold true for the Nimrod. Developed, paid for, largely finished, scrapped 😡

If just half of the rumours I’ve heard today are true, Nimrod MRA4 was far from being finished in any shape or form and most likely would have never have been without injection of a very large amount of cash.