They had a little craze of seeing what they could fit in; pallets, Cessna hull, 26 jumpers and so on. Effectively, they realised how useful it was and the only constraint in Ireland was staying on paved runways because it was designed to operate off unsealed runways. I was just thinking how useful it would have been to be able to deploy tools and manpower to Donegal via Carrickfin Airport for the recent weather disasters.
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This December's issue of 'Air Forces Monthly' includes an article 'Survey - European MPAs: Part 2' with only two countries featuring...
the Irish Air Corps... as the first page, followed by Italy (Navy, Coast Guard and 'Finance GardaÃ'! (my translation!)).
Makes the IAC operation sound pretty impressive to the wider world audience i'd say (but possibly needing a little sympathy too i.e. only two aircraft for a large area).Last edited by WhingeNot; 25 November 2017, 15:46.
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The thee different Italian services show three different aircraft... all twin propeller.. including the small (P.166) Coast Guard example - with a small, under nose-mounted radar (re: the other IMO debate thread on the 'Cessna Replacement' and MPA additional/supplementary use).
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Different roles.
Guardia Costiera have rescue as their main role, with the secondary roles of Maritime Law enforcement, protection of marine resources, fisheries and enforcement of navigation regulations.
Guardia de Finanza are similar to Customs or Revenue in their role, but are a military force under the Italian department of Economy and Finance who deal with counter narcotics and anti smuggling.
Of course the Marina Militare has a much wider role geographically, and requires aircraft capable of much more than just coastal patrol. However since the retirement of the Atlantique, does it have any? Can the ATR do anti sub?For now, everything hangs on implementation of the CoDF report.
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Re: #213 and #214 - in my excitement (! ) in seeing such a positive article about the IAC in international press, I did not see that Greece was included in the survey, though for P-3 (four props) aircraft that have been out of service for a few years, but are about to be modernised and brought back into service.
The Italian article also cites five, not three, examples of MPAs (all twin props) just retired, almost retired, or still in or new to service i.e. Atlantic (just retired), the ATR42 & ART72 and the P.166 & P.180.
The same magazine issue also includes news items about Dornier 228s and Dornier228NGs (twin props), and Cessna and SAAB business jets for maritime surveillance and similar maritime tasks.Last edited by WhingeNot; 28 November 2017, 01:09.
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The latest issue of Air Forces Monthly, in its continued MPA nations survey, describes the outgoing P-3s (x6) and the incoming P-8s (x5) of Norway, the MPA capability of The Netherlands represented by two Coast Guard Dornier Do-288s (previously x13 Air Force P3s...), and last but not least, the relatively recently introduced King-Air MPAs (x3) of the Malta DF.
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An interesting bit on Finland's 295's I thought:
Dragon Shield, an airborne surveillance system developed by Lockheed Martin for the Finnish Defense Forces has been deemed operational, a Lockheed press release announced Friday [?IMG]. The platform achieved its final operational capability milestone after a series of flight tests that “evaluated compliance of the aircraft to civilian and military airworthiness requirements as well as system requirements verification,” Lockheed said. Work involved integrating a containerized surveillance system that rolls on and off on a Airbus CASA C-295 [?IMG] cargo aircraft and also features an open, modular architecture that enables future upgrades to be easily added. Dragon Shield will allow Finland to collect electronic intelligence, communications or signals intelligence capabilities in order to enhance situational awareness for the aircrew and provide command and control nodes with better imagery intelligence.
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I see the 2040 development plan has a specific "defence" section, and the highlight is a further 2 Maritime patrol aircraft needed post Brexit.
https://www.rte.ie/news/politics/201...ect-2040-plan/"Why am I using a new putter? Because the last one didn't float too well." -Craig Stadler
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