Wow
Wedgetail impresses

By PTE John Wellfare

SQNLDR Geoff Fox, No. 34 Squadron XO, photographs the Wedgetail at RAAF Base Fairbairn.

Photo by CPL Craig Eager

MEMBERS of the Air Force’s Airborne Early Warning and Control project have been inspired by the fruit of their labour making its first trip to Australia.

The Wedgetail, a heavily modified 737-700, touched down at RAAF Base Williamtown on March 14 for a visit to No. 2 Squadron. Williamtown will become the aircraft’s home when it is delivered in November next year.

2SQN CO Wing Commander Tracey Friend said the aircraft’s visit had been a great boost to the squadron’s capability development staff. “Many people in the project haven’t seen the aircraft,” she said.

“They’ve been working on the project and the capability realisation tasks at RAAF Base Williamtown and haven’t had a chance to get to Seattle to see the aircraft while it was in modifications. So they’ve been rapt to actually see what they’ve been working on.”

WGCDR Friend, who finishes her three-year posting as CO 2SQN at the end of this year and won’t be in command of the squadron when the first two operational aircraft arrive, said the Wedgetail represented “absolutely leading-edge technology”.

“From the capability, the crew concepts, from the types of roles that we will be conducting, it’s very much leading-edge and different to any of the E3 or E2 [AWACS] operators around the world.

Wedgetail’s good impression

The Wedgetail makes its first appearance in Canberra. The aircraft visited several RAAF bases.

Photo by CPL Craig Eager

“It’s very exciting for our crowd to see it come to fruition, albeit not a fully mission-capable jet yet,” said WGCDR Friend.

“It was a huge morale and a huge motivational boost to see the aircraft here with less than 18 months to go before it arrives for real and is mission-capable.” Defence’s Wedgetail program manager, Bill Spencer, said the project had come a long way in the two years he’d been involved.

“When I first joined the project two years ago, they had just finished doing critical design of the main aircraft,” he said. Although Mr Spencer had seen the aircraft during its modification in Seattle, he had not seen it airborne until its arrival in Australia, which he described as “an absolutely fantastic experience”.

“It’s a very exciting program to be part of. In the past couple of years we’ve finished the design process for all of the ground segments, which is the mission support system, the operational mission simulator, the operational flight trainer and the support facility.

“They are all well on track now and, in fact, the flight trainer commenced its test program a week ago [on March 7].”

Patrick Gill, Boeing’s Australian Air Force coordinator, said the Wedgetail project had been running on schedule, with enough time in the program to fit in the Australian tour. “I’m 100 per cent sure that we are going to deliver an integrated system in November of 2006,” he said.

He said the visit to Australia, apart from giving Boeing a great opportunity to display its most advanced AEW&C platform at the Australian International Air Show at Avalon, was a great way for all the project’s participants to see “real hardware come out of a dream that the Royal Australian Air Force has had for many, many years”.

The Wedgetail also visited RAAF Base Fairbairn, where it was inspected by a number of senior Defence and Government officials, RAAF Base Edinburgh, where BAE systems has been developing simulators and electronic support and protection measures for the platform, and RAAF Base Amberley, where Boeing Australia will modify four 737-700s to complete the Air Force’s six-aircraft capability.

First Thoughts

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