BAe Hawk

BAe Eagle Story

The BAe Hawk has one of the most successful flight histories of any light jet trainer, with origins dating back decades. The genre is referred to as a "senior coach", although he retains light attack as a secondary role. The Eagle was born out of a request from the British military to replace its aging and high-maintenance Folland Gnat range of light jet-powered aircraft.

The addition of Light Eagle Strike support also means the aircraft can be replicated in any buyer's inventory and increases its attractiveness for export sales from an economic standpoint. To date, more than 900 Hawk prototypes have been built, including several notable variants. The U.S.

Navy uses a heavily modified Eagle, known as the "T-45 Goshawk," described below and in a separate entry on this website. The other large operators are Australia, Finland and India.

About 18 countries currently use some form of eagle in their aircraft stables - an astonishing statistic considering the type first entered service in 1976.

A requirement for the RAF was born in 1964 for a new, modern jet trainer. Hawker Siddeley itself was originally established as the Hawker Siddeley Aircraft Company before WWII, using its own funds to initiate an in-house design programme to bring its product to the attention of curious RAF RAF, the P.1182 designation was officially introduced in 1969 and ended up being called HS. 1182. British military authorities liked what they saw and selected the design as their next jet trainer in October 1971, resulting in a contract for approximately 175 the following year. The aircraft is officially designated as the "Eagle" in British inventory.

The Hawker prototype first flew on August 21, 1974, and later production began in April 1976 as the Eagle T. Mk 1. A total of 176 Hawk T. Mk 1s were delivered to the RAF. In 1977 the Hawker Siddeley name ceased to exist and became British Aerospace.

British Aerospace itself will be transformed into the MAS division of BAe Systems in 2007 - officially giving the aircraft the more commonly known 'BAe Hawk' name.

Six Hawk 129 AJTs have been delivered to Bahrain since 2003. The aircraft is also fully maintained and supported by British Aerospace. Bahrain maintainers are trained at the BAe Warton factory in the UK before working at the Royal Bahrain Air Force Base.

The military relationship between India and the United Kingdom was further strengthened as the former committed to buy 66 modernized Eagle Mk 132s for the Indian Air Force. The first 24 were produced by BAe and delivered to the Indian government in December 2007, while the rest were locally produced by India's Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL).

The operational capability of this version in the IAF ranks in February 2008. This model is powered by a Rolls-Royce Adour Mk.

871 turbofan engine, and as of July 2010, follow-up orders for 57 more Hawk Mk 132 models have surfaced - these models will be allocated to 40 IAF examples, the rest 17 will be used by the Indian Marine Corps.

Hawk 200 is considered the most unique and deadly version of the Hawk series. Unlike previous trainers, the Hawk 200 is a single-seat mount specifically classified as a light multirole fighter. This variant originated in 1984 as part of the BAe program to increase the Eagle's global appeal, and on May 19, 1986 a modified demonstration aircraft was airborne.

The Hawk 200 differs from previous Hawk models primarily by having a new front fuselage. There are also the requisite full-extended wing flaps, wingtip missile support and optional air-to-air refueling capability.

As a result, the Eagle 200 can be called upon to perform a variety of mission types, including air defense and elimination of naval threats, as well as air-to-air interception, close support of friendly ground forces, and conventional ground attack and concentration of enemy fortifications. Although the evaluation model was lost due to an accident, development of the Hawk 200 continued and a pre-production form appeared in 1987. Parts commonality between it and the Hawk 100 is said to be close to 80%, meaning current Hawk operators can gain some logistical headroom from having both Hawk forms. The radar was tested on the Eagle 200 by the "Eagle 200RDA" demonstrator with an AN/APG-66H series F-16A class radar mounted on the nose.

Like other modern forms of the Eagle, the Eagle 200 features an all-glass cockpit, digital systems, advanced avionics, HUD and HOTAS. With the delivery of the Hawk 203, Oman becomes the first Hawk 200 buyer. Malaysia received 18 Hawk 208s, while Indonesia received 32 Hawk 209s.

The Royal Saudi Air Force accepted the prospect of the Hawk 205, but never committed.

While the US Navy T-45 Goshawk is a simple offshoot of the British BAe Hawk, it is largely considered its own, in order to meet the US Navy's requirements for an advanced, carrier-capable jet trainer Countless revisions have been made. Replaces aging T-2C Buckeyes and TA-4J Skyhawks. Hawk's USN selection is a huge endorsement of BAe's product, as most U.S. politicians typically struggle to keep military spending in-house with U.S. corporations and their respective constituency votes.

BAe has enhanced its U.S. opportunities through a specialized crossover partnership with aerospace giant McDonnell Douglas (now a subsidiary of Boeing) and a lucrative procurement agreement with the U.S. government.

The Goshawk (named by the US Navy to distinguish the aircraft from existing HAWK missiles in US inventory) is characterized by its two-wheeled nose gear legs, larger tail surface, wider gear berth, front Edge wing slats and lightning rods. Additionally, the single-plate underside air brakes of the original Eagle have been replaced with a two-piece system that mounts the air brakes on either side of the rear wing. The dual ventral struts were also replaced by a single mount, with small airflow "breakers" visible in front of each horizontal stabilizer.

Because the original Eagle was primarily a land-based design, much effort was spent on converting the aircraft to a U.S. Navy carrier-based aircraft, delaying evaluation trials until 1991 and formal training for U.S. Navy pilots until 1994.

In addition to its military use, the Eagle's early success inspired the RAF to adopt the nimble small aircraft as the main mount for its "Red Arrows" air acrobatics team in 1979, further extending the Eagle's range. Additionally, this helps BAe demonstrate the inherent capabilities of its agile aircraft systems to other potential global customers.

BAe Hawk Specification

BASICS

MANUFACTURING

ROLES

DIMENSIONS

WEIGHTS

POWER

PERFORMANCE

ARMAMENT

VARIANTS