As the Royal Air Force commemorates and celebrates its 100th anniversary, Thales reflects on its rich heritage of supporting the world’s first independent air force.
Since day one, we have stood alongside the RAF, helping them to defend Britain’s skies and protect the nation’s power and influence around the world.
Saluting a century side by side
Thales is immensely proud of its sustained contribution to the RAF’s leadership in the delivery of Air Power over the last 100 years. Our steadfast partnership has seen continuous developments and enhancements in the RAF’s ever-expanding capabilities, including the advanced training and simulation services that serve to keep fellow servicemen and women, as well as citizens across the world, safer and more secure.
Aerial reconnaissance reaches new heights
The story actually begins just before the Royal Air Force came in to being, with Thales’ Vintens reconnaissance cameras bolted to the fuselage of Royal Flying Corps’ Sopwith Camels in 1916, midway through WWI. With the formation of the Royal Air Force on 1 April 1918, Thales continued to provide reconnaissance cameras to enhance the RAF’s Intelligence and Situational Awareness capabilities.
Monitoring continental Europe
This role continued into WWII, when our Vintens F24 cameras featured on RAF Spitfires, Westland Lysanders and Mosquitos. For the versatile Spitfires, armaments were replaced with camteras and additional fuel tanks to cover longer distances at high and low altitude. Mosquitos carried up to five cameras in various configurations, and with air speeds of up to 422mph, swiftly gathered aerial intelligence to support the Armed Forces’ role in liberating the continent.
Cold War capability
The RAF’s jet-powered Canberra effectively replaced the Mosquito, and featured prominently in Cold War surveillance and intelligence gathering. The Canberra carried our versatile and multi-operational F95 cameras during a 53-year role as a leading reconnaissance aircraft.
Technological leaps and bounds into the modern era
Today, Thales designs, develops and manufactures electro-optical and infrared cameras, plus laser range-finders for airborne reconnaissance systems aboard RAF aircraft. We also support today’s RAF with Ground Imagery Exploitation Systems (GIES), a high-resolution reconnaissance imagery display that integrates seamlessly with aircraft navigation data.
Dambusters mission
From WWII to the present day, Thales has supplied fuzes for weapons aboard a range of RAF aircraft. Perhaps most notably, EMI (now Thales) provided the hydrostatic fuzes for the ‘bouncing bombs’ aboard the RAF’s Lancaster aircraft immortalised in the pivotal Dambusters mission of Operation Chastise in 1943.
Fuzes for combat scenarios
We went on to supply the fuze for the De Havilland Firestreak air-to-air missile – the very first of its kind, carried by such RAF greats as the Lightning, and the Gloster Javelin. In later years, Thales developed fuzes for the Red Top air-to-air missile, and for the JP233 runway craterer and Paveway Laser Guided Bombs.
Today, Thales supplies the fuzes for an array of RAF weapons carried by Tornado and Typhoon aircraft, including the Paveway IV Laser Guided Bomb, ASRAAM air-to-air missile, and the Storm Shadow cruise missile.
Training RAF pilots for over 87 years
We have been training RAF pilots and crews since 1931, when Thales-owned Redifon built Europe’s first fully electronic flight simulator. Since then, we’ve developed and delivered over 300 complex simulators for 60 different platforms. Our simulation and training support for the RAF has been integral to our relationship to this day, and is set to continue well into the future.
Thales also maintained and upgraded simulators for the RAF’s VC-10 refuelling aircraft, and for its Lockheed Tristar tanker and transport fleet. We proudly provided simulator training and support for the VTOL Harrier Jump Jet – a stalwart of the RAF from 1969 to 2010 – as well as for the Jaguar, and the Air Transport fleet’s famous Hercules.
Supporting the RAF Tornado Force its entire life
We have also supported the RAF’s Tornado force since the aircraft was first introduced to service in 1980. Since 1999, we have provided the Tornado GR4 training capability at RAF Lossiemouth and Marham which includes provision of the buildings infrastructure, engineers, instructors, administration staff, classroom facilities, desktop training systems and three full flight simulators. As part of the RAF’s ‘Whole Force’, Thales has provided over 38,000 simulator sorties, accumulated over 57,000 simulator flying hours, trained over 600 pilots, supported major training exercises, prepared aircrew for deployment and delivered over 75 simulator updates to remain current with Tornado aircraft developments and operational requirements.
Thales has also notched up over 42,000 hours of Tucano simulation at RAF Linton-on-Ouse in North Yorkshire.
Training tomorrow’s RAF pilots
Today, Thales is a member of the AirTanker consortium, which provides the RAF with a fleet of Voyager aircraft (based on the Airbus A330-200 passenger aircraft) for Air-to-Air Refuelling, Air Transport and Aeromedical roles. As part of AirTanker, we also provide integrated training services for air and ground crews at the purpose-built Voyager Training Academy at RAF Brize Norton. Thales is a primary sub-contractor for the RAF’s Voyager programme, supplying mission simulators, defensive aids, avionics and mission planning systems.
Further still, we provide a number of key systems on the RAF’s next-generation military transport aircraft, the Atlas (A400M). For example, we provide the cockpit display and navigation systems, and the flight controls and electrical systems. In 2013, Thales co-signed an 18-year contract with the UK Ministry of Defence to supply training services at Brize Norton, which includes the design, construction and management of the Atlas (A400M) Training School, and the installation and maintenance of full-flight A400M simulators.
Delivering High-G training
Looking ahead, Thales is in the process of delivering a new High-G training facility at RAF Cranwell, which we will run for at least the next five years, providing up to 1,000 days of ‘rapid onset’ high-G preparation for the next generation of F35 Lightning II, Hawk and Typhoon pilots. We’re helping to ensure the RAF’s elite fast-jet pilots remain the benchmark by which all others are measured.
We bring a depth of expertise that is almost unparalleled in the production and delivery of full mission simulators, and were recently awarded a contract by the MOD to provide a High G trainer for training future fast jet pilots in the High G environment”
Al Mackay Thales Export Sales Director for the Air Business
Avionics and mission systems
Thales’ century-long side-by-side relationship with the RAF also extends to Avionics and Mission Systems. Thales supplied the Searchwater Radar System on the Nimrod Maritime Reconnaissance (MR2) aircraft, and has supported the Royal Air Force Chinook Helicopter Force continuously since 1977. Thales provided the Royal Air Force Chinook’s Integrated Navigational Solution and Night Enhancement programmes and has also delivered Project JULIUS - the Chinook’s digital Cockpit Display System and on-board Mission Avionic System.
We also provide full Mission Support Systems at RAF headquarters and units worldwide. For example, we deliver the AirScape Air Information Management System, and have developed this continuously since the 1980s to meet ever-changing operational needs.
Identifying invisible threats
In partnership with the MOD’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, and its Defence Equipment and Support department, Thales has developed and delivered the Biological Surveillance and Collector System (BSCS) to the RAF. This ‘game- changing’ surveillance system detects and evaluates airborne biological threats, thereby protecting airfield-based RAF personnel in unprecedented ways, all over the world.
Air Command and Control
These enablers ensure the delivery of RAF Air Power. The Thales UK Tactical Air Control Centre (UK TACC) of No.1 Air Control Centre – first introduced in 2002 – has supported RAF operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and is currently providing air battlespace management to RAF aircraft operating over Syria and Iraq. The UK TACC remains the RAF’s only deployable, ground-based Air Command and Control System.
Air Traffic Management
In 2015, in a joint venture with NATS, Thales secured Project Marshall, a 22-year contract to provide the MOD with all of its Air Traffic Management (ATM) services across every MOD airfield in the UK and overseas. This includes deployable ATM capabilities to support the military’s expeditionary air operations.
A digital future
As the RAF continues to embrace Digital Transformation, Thales will continue to look at ways we can support the RAF as leading experts in Secure Systems and Cyber Security capabilities. And as the RAF moves into new domains such as space (with the recent launch of its first satellite), and with the introduction of more autonomous platforms to its fleet, we will be there to offer our expertise and support.
Here’s to the next 100 years
As we celebrate RAF100, and a century of close partnership, Thales and the RAF are already spearheading aviation’s technological advance into the next 100 years.
Working together, we’ll continue to lead our industries and onlookers by example, and continue protecting peace and security in new and exciting ways. We’re also inspiring and supporting future generations of RAF talent, with STEM learning initiatives and graduate apprenticeship schemes.
Whatever the challenges we face together, Thales is deeply committed to its relationship with the RAF. We look forward to a bright future of innovating together to ensure the RAF’s success for a second century.