Ejercito del Aire (Spanish Air Force)

[Matt308]

Here's how to resize them. You post another oversize and I will delete your threads.

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/announcements/image-sizing-guidelines-24388.html#post662400

 

[gekho]

The Eurofighter Typhoon is a twin-engine canard-delta wing multirole aircraft. It is being designed and built by a consortium of three companies: Alenia Aeronautica, BAE Systems, and EADS working through a holding company Eurofighter GmbH which was formed in 1986. The project is managed by NETMA (NATO Eurofighter and Tornado Management Agency) which acts as the prime customer.

The series production of the Eurofighter Typhoon is underway, and the aircraft is being procured under three separate contracts (named "tranches"), each for aircraft with generally improved capabilities. The aircraft has entered service with the British Royal Air Force, the German Luftwaffe, the Italian Air Force, the Spanish Air Force and the Austrian Air Force. Saudi Arabia has signed a £4.43 billion (approx. €6.4 billion c. 2007, $9.5 billion) contract for 72 aircraft.

 

[gekho]

On 4 August 2003, Germany accepted the first series production Eurofighter (GT003). Also that year, Spain took delivery of its first series production aircraft. On 16 December 2005, the Typhoon reached I.O.C. with Italian Air Force as an air defence fighter from Grosseto Air Base. On 9 August 2007, the UK's Ministry of Defence reported that No. XI Squadron of the RAF, which stood up as a Typhoon squadron on 29 March 2007, had taken delivery of its first two multi-role Typhoons. Two of XI Squadron's Typhoons were sent to intercept a Russian Tupolev Tu-95 approaching British airspace on 17 August 2007.

The RAF Typhoons were declared combat ready in the air-to-ground role by 1 July 2008. The RAF Typhoons will be ready to deploy for operations by mid-2008. On or around 25 April 2008 a Typhoon from 17 Squadron at RAF Coningsby, operating at the US Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake test centre in California, USA, suffered extensive damage during landing when its landing gear did not deploy. Although no immediate cause was determined it was speculated that pilot error may have been to blame. A Board of Enquiry was convened. On 11 September 2008, the combined flying time of the five customer Air Forces and the industrial Flight Test programme saw aircraft surpass the 50,000 flight hours milestone.

On 31 March 2009 a Eurofighter Typhoon fired an AMRAAM for the first time whilst having its radar in passive mode, the necessary target data for the missile was acquired by the radar of a second Eurofighter Typhoon and transmitted using the Multi Functional Information Distribution System (MIDS). On 17 July 2009, Italian Air Force Eurofighters were deployed to protect Albania's airspace.