Image Gallery: May 2009
27 May 2009
No 38 SQN King Air on the production line
Faster, more reliable and more cost-effective transport will be ushered in at Number 38 Squadron (38SQN), when the unit takes delivery of eight Hawker Beechcraft King Air 350 aircraft over the coming year.
Bringing an end to the de Havilland Canada DHC-4 Caribou’s outstanding 45 years of service to the Royal Australian Air Force, the interim King Air project also represents the end of a small but important chapter in Army’s history, with the cessation of all Army fixed-wing aircraft operations after more than four decades of continuous service.
Wing Commander Stewart Dowrie, leader of the Air Lift Group King Air Transition Team, said the three King Air 350s currently flying with Army would be transferred to 38SQN in November 2009.
“We have a real advantage in this transition because Army’s 173 Surveillance Squadron has developed a mature and highly effective capability that we can use as the nucleus of the new 38SQN,” Wing Commander Dowrie said.
“Another five brand new aircraft will then be brought in to 38SQN in the first half of 2010 to round out a fleet of eight aircraft.
“The first of these new aircraft, to be assigned the Australian Defence Force (ADF) serial number of A32-651, is currently on the Hawker Beechcraft production line in Wichita, Kansas.”
The King Air 350 will redefine how 38SQN does business, and increase the range of options for the delivery of Air Lift Group’s customers to their destinations.
“While it won’t be able to land on the types of very short airfields the Caribou has become famous for, the King Air will offer a new range of opportunities to the ADF.
“The King Air is more than twice as fast and is capable of flying more than double the range of the Caribou.
“It also has a pressurised cabin, which allows it to cruise at altitudes of up to 35,000 feet.
“Moving people across vast distances such as northern Australia and throughout Southeast Asia and the South Pacific is exactly what the aircraft is designed for,” he said.
The change in airframes at 38SQN will be managed by the Air Lift Group B300 Transition Team, working closely with Defence Materiel Organisation’s Training Aircraft Systems Project Office (TASPO), which already manages ADF King Air contracts with Hawker Pacific Australia.
Mr Allan Williams, the TASPO B300 Project Manager, said “38SQN is receiving a known performer in the King Air”.
“Both Defence Materiel Organisation and Air Force are committed to bringing the King Airs into service with 38SQN on time and on budget,” he said.
Equipped with a glass cockpit and other modern avionics system, the King Air will also act as an ideal bridging step for pilots to progress to larger, more complex glass-cockpit aircraft such as the C-130J Hercules, Wedgetail, C-17A Globemaster and KC-30A.
The King Air is not a permanent replacement for the Caribou, with Project Air 8000 Phase Two tasked to provide the long-term solution.
Wing Commander Dowrie said it was important to note that neither the Caribou nor the King Air were capable of delivering the form of combat airlift needed for the more complex and wider-ranging requirements of operations today.
“The interim King Air project is all about how we best support the ADF and transform the Air Lift Group work force, between now and the arrival of the Air 8000 Phase 2 aircraft,” he said.
More: Air Force News | Minister for Defence release | DHC-4 Caribou | Beechcraft King Air 350
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