The UK Military Flying Training System (MFTS) is possibly the most radical shake-up of aircrew training for all three armed services in a generation. Aimed at providing comprehensive training facilities for aircrew from all UK armed forces over a 25-year period, MFTS is a bold across-the-board programme to overhaul and enhance training effectiveness. With such a wide-ranging series of objectives in mind, the programme – which is run by Ascent Flight Training (a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and VT Group) as the MoD’s preferred training partner – is being implemented in stages. One of the first of these stages has been the Advanced Jet Trainer (AJT) component, for which the BAE Systems Hawk Mk 128 aircraft (known as the Hawk T2 in RAF service) was selected even before contract award. A total of 28 Hawk T2s are on order for the programme and delivery to the RAF has already begun. Operational requirements have driven a move on the part of many nations to fourth and fifth generation aircraft capable of performing multiple roles. Partly due to a desire for logistic simplification and partly in order to ensure tactical and strategic flexibility, the emergence of these aircraft has made significant demands on training solutions. “Multi-role aircraft demand multi-role pilots in order to manage our aerospace assets,” says Air Commodore Sean Bell, Head of Capability (Theatre Airspace) at MoD and the MoD MFTS lead officer. The procurement of these more capable aircraft comes at a price, meaning that less of
them can be operated within the increasingly austere budgets available to the military. The direct effect of this means there are less aircraft available for training – they are swallowed up by operational imperatives – which in turn means there has to be a higher reliance on more flexible training solutions and a better mix of live and synthetic aircrew training. While there is an argument that says one could achieve this balance by upgrading existing aircraft (such as the Hawk T1, for example) and combining these facilities with more simulators and computer-based training, this argument falls down when examined closely under the microscope of forensic accounting. “It would be difficult [to derive] the same level of training from upgrading a T1 – just putting in a glass cockpit doesn’t cut it. What we have to achieve is fundamental improvement in the through life costs and the ability to deliver capability to support the changing needs of the front line,” Bell says. In this respect – improving cost-effectiveness while simultaneously delivering greater capability rapidly – the MFTS programme has three major themes: closing the training gap between the output of MFTS (trained pilots) and the standards of frontline Operational Conversion Units (OCU); reducing cost; and optimising the time (and resources) invested in training.
For the AJT component of MFTS, Hawk T2 achieves these objectives in a number of ways. The advanced glass cockpit and embedded avionics and training system in the aircraft enable
BAE Hawk T2 (serial number ZK020) of the Royal Air Force at the Royal International Air Tattoo 2009 at RAF Fairford, England. Photo credit MilborneOne
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