Gripen Delivers to Czechs, Gears Up for Hungary and Beyond
It is just a year, 14 June 2004 to be precise, since the final signatures were placed on the Gripen contract for the Czech Air Force. In less than 12 months Gripen International, Saab and Sweden’s Defence Materiel Administration have made good on their word. The Czech Republic’s Gripens are now standing operational air defense missions from their new home at Caslav Air Base. The first six Czech Gripens were delivered in April and led the national VE-Day commemorations in a flypast over Prague on 8 May. The first Czech JAS 39D two-seater flew on 16 April and all of the Czech Air Force’s 14 Gripens (12 Cs, two Ds) will be handed over by August.
Turning to Gripen’s other immediate customers, deliveries to Hungary will begin in March 2006, for completion by 2007. The Hungarian Air Force is acquiring 14 Gripens, on a 10-year lease-to-buy agreement. The first aircraft for Hungary was rolled-out on 25 January 2005 and made its maiden flight on 16 February. As with the Czech pilots and technicians before them, Hungarians new Gripen crews are in training with the Swedish Air Force. The first Gripen for South Africa will fly in November and will be transferred there as a fully-instrumented test aircraft in June 2006.
In 2004 the Gripen flight test team undertook its most intensive flying program ever, with 260 sorties flown by the Linköping-based pilots. That figure will stand until the end of this year, when at least 280 test sorties are planned for completion. The Czech and Hungarian export aircraft have been having a big impact on the test pilots’ workload — in April this year alone 85 sorties were flown to support the Czech and Hungarian programs.
One important achievement during March/April was the qualification of the JAS 39C/D for air-to-air refuelling (AAR). Using a specially deployed South African Air Force Boeing 707 tanker, a group of three test pilots (including one South African) undertook over 400 tanker ‘hook ups’ to qualify the Gripen throughout the flight envelope— with a NATO-certified tanker. The Gripens were flown with multiple loads and were refuelled in pairs to test all possible conditions behind the tanker. The AAR program was finished ahead of schedule and went without a hitch. AAR clearance is now available to all Gripen operators.
Another crucial new capability is Gripen’s precision weapons fit. One final test campaign, to be completed this month over the Vidsel ranges, will see the Gripen fully cleared to operate with the Litening III designator and laser-guided bombs. Gripen’s helmet-mounted display (HMD) system, a key element of the weapons and flight management systems, will undertake it’s first ‘live’ airborne testing before the end of the year. A Gripen will also travel to Grenada, Spain, to complete hot-and-high testing of its environmental control system.
Before the end of 2005 a Gripen will undertake the first airborne firing of the MBDA Meteor ramjet-powered BVRAAM (beyond visual range air-to-air missile). This mission will be shared with the Eurofighter Typhoon beginning in 2006, but Gripen’s more advanced service status will see it taking an 80:20 share of the Meteor workload, Saab suggests. —Robert Hewson
