A400M gets go ahead

Seven European nations agreed yesterday to order 225 A400M military transport aircraft from Airbus Military to replace the ageing European airlift fleet.

Announcing the order yesterday at Farnborough, UK Defence Secretary Geoffrey Hoon and his colleagues from France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Turkey and Belgium said that their commitment "....allows the launch of this programme and underlines our shared commitment to enhancing European defence capability. It is a major opportunity for our industries."

In this initial order, Belgium ordered 7 aircraft, France 50 aircraft, Germany 73 aircraft, Italy 16 aircraft, Luxembourg 1 aircraft in close co-operation with Belgium, Spain 27 aircraft, Turkey 26 aircraft and the United Kingdom 25 aircraft.

Airbus has said it will apply to the programme its proven methods and procedures for developing and producing civilian aircraft. Nations will, to the maximum extent possible, adopt civilian practice and requirements.

Once the necessary legal status and arrangements are in place, the nations involved intend to use the Organisation for joint Armaments Co-operation (OCCAR) to manage the programme through a single contract for development, production and initial support.

Several nations have said that an early In Service Date is essential. Hoon said "There are tough commercial negotiations ahead with industry, not least on price. But we hope to conclude these satisfactorily so as to be able to award a contract to Airbus Military early next year."

This order will not have pleased American transport aircraft manufacturers, since the A400M sits between the ageing C-130 from Lockheed Martin and the C-17 from Boeing. The C-130 is essentially a design from the 1960s, and has significantly less capability than that planned for the new aircraft. While the C-17 beats the A400M for volume, payload, range and speed its costs are much higher.

At a recent briefing Airbus officials put the unit price of the A400M at $/Euros 80 million this gives a total cost of over $/Euros 18 billion. Airbus Military is confident of further export sales and has put $1.5 billion into development costs for the aircraft.

REF XQQEE XQQAR