Eyes in Sky in Dubai.

With its 2003 Air Show, Dubai has once more proved that, even if it isn't the largest international event of its kind in the world, it certainly wins hands down in terms of air display quality.

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One unique feature of Dubai, compared with Farnborough and Paris (le Bourget), is the ease of access the city offers to the air show venue. This alone plays an incommensurable role in the sociable attitude of those attending. The show is still a decent size, due to the fact that anyone directly connected with aviation at an international level is bound to be there.

Noses Up

Nowadays, Dubai is about the only international air show that still offers a real show in the air. We shall not give a full list here; but while some of the military aircraft flown were not exactly what is termed "state-of-the-art', they certainly caught the visitor's attention.

For instance, even the busiest visitor walking outside to his next appointment could not possibly resist stopping to stare at the F-117 as it sliced its way across the sky. Then of course, there was a lot of emotion when a nearby-stationed F-14 Tomcat filled the air showing all its possible wing configurations, passing low at high subsonic speed, then again at slow speed with tail hook dropped and so forth. An earlier F-16 also provided an aerial display to celebrate the first Block 60 maiden flight at Fort Worth. The event in Texas had actually taken place on 6 December, the day before the show opened its doors, and marked the first true materialisation of the new fleet of 80 F-16E/F aircraft destined to join the United Arab Emirates Air Force. The aircraft was selected in 1998 and deliveries are scheduled to be spread over a period of about two years, starting in 2004.

Alenia and Lockheed, brought their C-27J transport aircraft, which provided spectators an astonishing sky ballet; the aircraft performing unbelievably steep low speed turns, finishing its display with a low fly-by with the rear ramp wide open. With the exception of that ramp trick, the performance was largely matched by the Antonov 74TK, with a succession of steeply banked turns and low speed fly-bys. All those military aircraft flight displays were interspaced with commercial aircraft performances, of course, but as is usually the case in Dubai, never with any interruption or dead break between them.

A Boeing AH-64 pilot seemingly decided to do all the things that normal Apache pilots are told not to do unless they want to be kicked out of the Army. Suddenly a familiar roar filled the air: a Harrier. The type hadn't appeared for a while at international shows, but for many--and this includes the author--the typical and unrealistic manoeuvres, including the famous bow to the public, is a sight that no one ever got tired of over the years. Another aircraft that, although not exactly a recent development, caught everybody's attention whilst flying was the S-27. Flown by Sukhoi Pilot Yevgeny Frolov, this plain SK version (sans thrust vectoring sophistication) demonstrated that it was still 'with it', pulling a 120-degree Cobra, followed by a tail slide. Again nothing dramatically new, but always a heart-stopper.

The task of staging the latest European aviation technology at work was entrusted to a Dassault Rafale B, and this was something not to be missed. The aircraft almost appeared to be all over the place at the same time, its brilliant, and obviously physically fit pilot swiftly threading its way from one aerobatic figure to another. During the high-g manoeuvres the spectators couldn't be sure whether they had to be sorry for the aircraft or for its pilot. At the end of this unbelievably dense succession of rolls, ultra tight turns, barrel rolls, loops and so forth the commentator announced that the aircraft was now coming in to land; indeed the Rafale appeared high on the right--too high though. Yet, still in inverted flight with landing gear down (or up?), and after a quick recovery to normal attitude with engine almost on idle, but completely out of line with the runway, the aircraft stubbornly continued to sink down like a bird of prey. Then, when only a few tens of feet above the ground, the afterburner suddenly crackled to life again, thrusting the aircraft into a steep vertical-winged right-hand bank, abruptly followed by a 180-degree wing flip banking the aircraft to the left in one of the sharpest split-S manoeuvres the author had ever seen performed by a fighter aircraft of this category--but which allowed the Rafale to neatly line up with the runway for a breathtakingly short landing. Hats off to the pilot, who repeated the same performance every day, just before tea time.

This and That

The presence of the Boeing Longbow version of the Apache at Dubai was not just the result of a courtesy visit. The United Arab Emirates is currently evaluating a number of upgrade options for its Air Force (as indeed, this service is in charge of operating the attack helicopters in the region). The Air force currently operates 30 Apache As, and the question is whether an upgrade to the D standard is a cost effective solution or if an outright new buy would offer a longer term perspective. Interestingly, while neighbouring Kuwait has 12 D variants on order, Saudi Arabia is also considering the acquisition of the type. However, even the latter nation is beginning to feel the pinch from the ailing worldwide economy.

Sukhoi appears to be chalking up success after success with its Su-27 series. Of course not in such large numbers as in the past, but nevertheless a $120 million deal is always welcome as in the case of the four SU-30MKK (known as SU-30MKV in this particular instance) to be delivered to Vietnam where they will join a dozen Su-27s already operated by that nation's air force. Other recent orders have emanated from both Indonesia and Malaysia. Indonesia is to take delivery of two 27s and two 30s ordered in April 2003, while more recently--in August--Malaysia committed itself to the purchase of 18 SU-MKMs. Sukhoi's new and modern approach to maintenance guarantees explained to the author by the Russian manufacturer three years ago (see Armada issue 6/2001) now appear to bear fruit and bring that credibility to the supply of spare parts, an area that used to be the Russian aircraft's Achilles' heel in the past.

The UAE has also expressed an interest in the new Raytheon AIM9-X. This latest version of the ubiquitous Sidewinder, which has recently reached its initial operational capability with the US Air Force, is also being eyed by Oman and Saudi Arabia. However, more short-term concrete business on the X-rated missile is expected by Raytheon from Switzerland, which might even have placed an order by the time these lines are printed. A few more random notes from Raytheon: the Paveway IV guided bomb recently selected by Britain will be in service by 2007, the Jsow fitted with a unitary warhead is now in operational evaluation. Known as the -C, it draws on Broach warhead technology.

The Dubai air show is a fine and smooth trade show, where a lot of dealings around the world, that are usually hush-hush at other events, can be discretely brought out of the dunes if one knows which way the soft sand delicately needs to blow. A number of those collected stories, generally relating to missiles and drones, have already been seeded in this issue and in the one that preceded it.

RELATED ARTICLE: PGM, I Presume?

On display at MBDA's stand were two scaled-down mock-ups of the almost forgotten PGM air-to-ground weapon. Yet, well over 2000 copies of these have been manufactured and delivered to the United Arab Emirates Air Force, which appears to be its sole operator to date (although a company official told Armada "we're talking with [potential] customers"). The weapon, which comes under two designations that suggest their warhead weight in pounds, the PGM 2000 and PGM 500 can be fitted with a choice of three seekers (each common to the two sizes of weapon), namely semi-active laser, TV and infrared, with the latter two providing a one-metre targeting accuracy. Both the rocket motor-powered PGM 2000 (featured here) and the single rocket-powered PGM 500 are already qualified on the Mirage 2000-9 operated by the UAE and are now of course in the process of being qualified for use on the F-16 block 60. MBDA is now looking into upgrades to increase the range of the weapon, which entails the adoption of a GPS receiver. (MBDA)

RELATED ARTICLE: Dubai Hawkeye?

Before the actual show, much speculation was going on at Dubai as to whether the United Arab Emirates would use the event to formally announce its decision to purchase the Hawkeye AEW aircraft. However, this clearly was not to happen, and early 2004 was given as a more likely timeframe. Should a decision be made (possibly as these lines are being printed) regarding the five E-2Cs, the UAE would become the eighth member of the Hawkeye operators' club. In any event, the aircraft would not be new builds, but refurbished former US Navy airframes fitted with the Hawkeye 2000 suite, but would be the first to feature factory-fitted air-refuelling pods. This scaled-down mock-up gave the public a foretaste of the Hawkeye 2000's general layout. In fact, apart from the propellers, the aircraft really looks similar to the older model. However, there is a lot more under the skin (literally). Indeed, in order to enable the aeroplane to withstand the additional 7000 pounds it will carry, the wings have totally new spars and, it goes almost without saying, the engines come with full authority digital control. The radome also looks the same, but houses a Lockheed Martin ADS 18 radar for which the transmit chain was developed by Northrop Grumman and the receive chain by Raytheon. Aerial steering, on the other hand, is a combination of mechanical and electronic systems devised by L3. Northrop Grumman's ultimate aim with the Hawkeye 2000 is to provide a plug-and-play suite that will play a pivotal role in a network-centric warfare environment. As a company official put it "it will be a flying server in the sky, fusing information for commanders in the battlespace". But we are not quite there yet. This kind of technology takes time, and possibly worse, technology evolves as time flies past, and a lot can be expected to happen by the time the operational assessment is carried out, and the four planned aircraft go into operational evaluation. The calendar will then have flipped over to 2011, and the first of some 75 units will have begun to roll out. (Armada/EHB)