Avalon airshow 2011

[Jaryd stock]

Andrew I presume they will they be supported by tankers, if so do you know if they are KC-10's or 135's?

[Mike_S]

Originally Posted by A McLaughlin

Word is the F-22s will be AK tailed jets which are due to be on a deployment to Guam at the time of the show...

Did you mean Kadena or is there something going on at Guam also?

http://www.13af.pacaf.af.mil/news/st...p?id=123237373

[A McLaughlin]

Originally Posted by Mike_S

Did you mean Kadena or is there something going on at Guam also?

My understanding was Guam, but it may be Kadena. I think the B-2s will also fly nonstop 'global airpower' exercise missions to and from Avalon (and possibly Delemere as well) out of Guam each day.

The tanker/s will come from whichever unit has aircraft available to support the deployment, but may be ZZ tailed KC-135/s.

[Bob C]

The following link appeared on ADFSerials.com yesterday :

http://www.airshow.net.au/avalon2011...an-1st-F22.pdf

I also note that the B-52 has made an appearance lately.

[Jaryd stock]

I noticed on the aircraft attending the airshow that 2x Pakistani Hongdu K-8 karakorum trainers will be there, wouldn't it be great if a tanker were supporting them over possibly IL-78 Midas tanker ?.....Also a French CASA 235 and a C-27J Spartan from Italy will be attending.

[A McLaughlin]

The K-8 attendance is a strange one...surely the Chinese won't be bidding for Air 5428?!?!?! I don't think the K-8 is air refuellable, but they might be freighting them out in an Il-76/78?

Alenia have been making a renewed push for the C-27J as a Caribou replavement lately, as has Airbus Military with the CN-235...

[Jaryd stock]

Andrew are the RAAF close to making a decsion on a bou replacment ?

[A McLaughlin]

The decision has been made twice - first it was the C-295M back in 1999, then more recently the preferred aircraft was the the C-27J, but no announcement will be made until funding is in place which is unlikely until FY2013 at the earliest.

That said, there has been a push recently to get a couple more C-17s and to reassess the battlefield airlifter decision, with some claiming the CN-235 or something even smaller (e.g. Twotter, Do-228NG, Caravan, PAC-750) might even be looked at.

Either way, rumour has it the two extra C-130Js that were going to be bought next year now wont be, as they would be 12-13 years younger than the rest of the J fleet and would in fact become a sub-fleet with different support requirements.

Interesting times at ALG...

[Jaryd stock]

Interesting indeed, is Lockhead Martin still thinking of XL Hercules where they have basically supersized it [for an extra $1] like they did to the classic Hornet and came up with the Rhino. And what of the A400m as a replacement for the Hercs, I thought one was going to do a tour of australia soon, And considering that RAAF has now got the KC-30 nearly ready for IOC i think, I would of thought the A400 would of been a candidit for replacing the H or J model Hercs and that would give ALG a bit more room in there aircraft to play around with if need be. Any word on additional CH-47F's other than the ones being upgraded and the two that is it being bought....