New jets confirmed for Red Arrows in Hawk replacement

The Royal Air Force Red Arrows are to receive new jets to replace their ageing Hawk aircraft as part of a £360 million recapitalisation of the military’s jet training system, the Defence Investment Plan said.

The plan committed the money to what it called the full recapitalisation of the Jet Training System, intended to deliver both sovereign and international training with what it described as a significant UK workshare, and said the new aircraft would also let the Red Arrows retire the Hawk, a change it said would go on “inspiring young generations for decades to come.”

The commitment comes as the strain on the Hawk fleet has become hard to hide. The Red Arrows have flown the Hawk T1 since 1979 and are now the type’s only remaining operator, and this year the team cut most of its displays from the famous nine-jet Diamond formation to seven aircraft to ease the load on airframes that are due to leave service around 2030, a visible sign of a fleet running down.

The bigger problem the plan is trying to solve is the advanced training of the RAF’s future fast-jet pilots, which is carried out on the more modern Hawk T2 at RAF Valley on Anglesey under the UK Military Flying Training System. That fleet of twenty-eight aircraft entered service from 2012 but has been dogged by engine reliability problems that have limited how many jets are available on any given day, and the Strategic Defence Review last year called for both marks of Hawk to be replaced by a single cost-effective trainer, with the work prioritising British industry.

The plan does not name the aircraft that will replace the Hawk, and the choice is expected to be settled through a competition the RAF has been preparing to launch, with the Chief of the Air Staff having said earlier this year that he wanted a contest under way. Several aircraft are in contention, among them the Boeing and Saab T-7A Red Hawk, which BAE Systems has been promoting for a British build, the Leonardo M-346 and the Korean T-50, while a clean-sheet British design from the start-up Aeralis fell away after the company went into administration.

The promise of a significant UK workshare matters politically, with former Red Arrows pilots having petitioned against the selection of a foreign aircraft for so national a symbol.