Taking the field

“It is no longer and paper airplane,” Antonio Caramazanas, A400M program head, said. “It is real, it is tangible. This is the year of the A400M,” he extolled.

With engine control and gearbox issues that stymied earlier delivery now resolved, the French air force is in the process of accepting the first two of an initial order of 50 A400Ms.

“We are back on track,” Caramazanas said. “Maturity is already at an extremely good level,” he added, noting pragmatically that maturity is the product of the lengthy delays.

Caramazanas explained: “Logistic capabilities have been tested and proved; we are now developing tactical and tanker capabilities,” adding that all tactical milestones are to be achieved by the third quarter of 2014 and tanker capabilities by the third quarter of 2015.

“We are back on track. Maturity is already at an extremely good level.”

This period of further validation coincides with the A400M’s initial delivery schedule. Following the French air force, Turkey will take delivery of the first of 10 A400Ms this year. The RAF, with orders for 22 aircraft starting in 2014 will precede Germany’s 53 A400Ms later that year, followed by the Malaysia (four from 2015 onwards), Spain (27 from 2016), Luxembourg (one in 2019) and Belgium (seven from 2019).

Prospects

To date, with orders for 174 aircraft,******** already the A400M has 32 per cent of the medium airlifter market. ********** While the European governments have a big stake in the development and future success of the aircraft, and thus have the principal shares of orders, outside Europe is where Airbus Military sees strong medium-term potential for the A400M.

South Africa is known to be actively considering a reversal of its 2009 order cancellation for eight A400Ms and acquire up to seven A400Ms in what would become the first southern hemisphere deployment.

“Airbus Military sees potential for 400 sales over the next 30 years.”

There has been speculation about whether South Africa will take some airframes currently earmarked for the German defence forces. While Airbus Military would not be drawn on the possibility of diluting the German order, the manufacturer preferred to promote the broadening of the A400M’s geographical sphere of operation as being more strategically significant.

Like its commercial sister company, Airbus Military sees international collaboration as strongly supporting local sales opportunities, and South Africa would provide a strong regional springboard.

In June, Airbus Military announced it had placed a third work package with South Africa’s Denel Aerostructures (DAe) for the manufacture of structural components for the A400M in a deal that includes production of ribs and spars for the aircraft’s vertical tail plane.
Although cancelling its A400M order in 2009, South Africa has remained a production partner in the program, manufacturing components including the wing-fuselage fairing, top shells, wing tips, and cabin and cockpit linings. Despite the order setback, Airbus was reluctant to disengage from South Africa in the hope of future orders. The announcement by Airbus that it has increased its work packages to South Africa represents a positive signal of an order in the nearer-term.

Airbus Military has five A400Ms in the test program, six in final assembly, 15 in production and a further five (MSNs 28-32) in long-lead production.

The A400M was certified by the European civil airworthiness authority EASA in March and will be certified progressively by respective customers’ national military authorities. Some 85 per cent of the civil certification forms part of the military scope of certification, something Caramazanas said was a unique approach that has helped get the A400M into service faster than would have otherwise be the case.

Unique

One of the key attributes of the A400M is its unique position in airlift capabilities, fitting between tactical and strategic capacity, with the performance of a tactical aircraft and range of a strategic platform.

The manufacturer does not see any competition in the A400M’s niche for at least 10 years. Its only potential competitor is Embraer’s KC-390, an aircraft so far unproven and potentially limited in tactical roles by its jet engines. Still, Airbus Military does not take for granted it will retain its singular position in the A400M’s airlift category and for the moment at least considers the KC-390 as a potential threat if only by virtue of the Brazilian aircraft being the sole clean-sheet design in the offing.

**********Airbus Military sees potential for 400 sales over the next 30 years ********** across Asia, Northern Africa, Central and South America – and the Antipodes.

Already Airbus sees the replacement of the Pacific region’s C-130 fleet as an opportunity – albeit in the 5 to 15-year horizon.

By around 2030 the RAAF’s C-130J fleet will be due for replacement and/or life extension. With A400M production largely committed through to 2019, Airbus Military sees this timeframe as natural longer-term continuation of its production line.

Meanwhile, within an earlier timeframe, New Zealand’s retirement of its C-130H transports within 10 years is also a key target of Airbus Military’s campaign for the A400M and initial presentations are understood to have already occurred.

Pitching alongside the A400M will be the smaller tactical transport, the newly-launched C295W. Airbus Military’s argument is that the combination of the two would not only deliver the required capacity, but would offer significant benefits to flexibility.

In both the case of Australia and New Zealand, Airbus Military sees the broad geographic sphere of operations as being well-suited to the tactical and strategic roles the A400M can perform, but in the case of New Zealand would be well-suited to smaller, shorter-range operations closer to home.

Field-ready

It is the breadth of tactical and strategic capabilities that form the basis of the A400M’s design philosophy.

With a payload of 37t, the A400M can deliver up to 17.4t more than the C-130J. Where the real differentiation lies is in the A400M’s rough field capabilities, allowing the insertion of increased payload – troops, armament, supplies and helicopters up to the size of the MH90 into tactical positions. Airbus Military said while the C-130J and C-17 have a proven and valuable place in the airlift inventory, their limitations to prepared fields generally mean operating such aircraft well away from front-line positions where heavy-load tactical insertions are needed.

This is why Airbus Military is convinced the A400M is the right aircraft at the right time.

An analysis of airlift capabilities and the range of demands currently in action around the European, Middle East and North African theatres shows clearly where the A400M sits distinctly apart from its colleagues.

Larger airlifters such as the C-17 and Antonov 124, while having more payload capacity than the A400M, require paved runways, which in the main puts payload deliveries away from front lines. The C-130, on the other hand, has proven tactical capabilities but cannot uplift the loads of an A400M, necessitating more rotations.

Airbus Military used the example of recent conflicts in Mali to demonstrate its case for the A400M, where An124s and C-130s were deployed to paved runways some 900km from the conflict area, demanding long convoys of vehicles and personnel with attendant vulnerability and risk during transit.

The A400M, Airbus Military said, could have operated closer to front lines obviating the risk of ground convoys and greatly improving field agility and timeliness of deliveries.

It is in this type of theatre the A400M thrives, Airbus said, and its impressive off-the-line, field-ready survivability inventory, which includes infrared sensors, flare dispensers and armoured cockpit, enables it to penetrate deeper towards battle fronts than competitor off-the-shelf airlifters.

Ian Elliot, head of defence capability marketing for Airbus Military said RAF C-130J pilots who have flown the A400M not only appreciate its agile, tactically-suited performance, but its standard survivability kit, all of which are add-ons to competitor aircraft.

“They look at the A400M and see a lot of what is being retrofitted to the C-130J as having been fitted as standard on our aeroplane,” Elliot said, adding that taking aircraft out of service for modifications and testing lessens their availability for active service at critical times when demands for airlift support are critical.

Future credibility

Airbus Military is certainly energetically enthusiastic about the future of the A400M, just as it is about its experience with the MRTT in Australia. The manufacturer sees this region as important to its strategic future. Importantly it has learned lessons from the entry-into-service of the KC-30A and though still smarting from its loss of the Caribou replacement competition, is not deterred now that its portfolio of transport aircraft are field-proven.

Now that the manufacturer has earned some street-cred with the KC-30A – and is determined to maintain that credibility – it arguably has a stronger claim for a seat at the negotiating table for the A400M than it once had.

With transport aircraft covering the range of light tactical through to the boundary-crossing A400M’s hybrid tactical/strategic capabilities and beyond to the MRTT’s heavy airlift capacity, Airbus Military sees it has the all-round solution.