Although primarily designed as “light-interim fighter trainer,” the South Korean-made F/A-50 “Fighting Eagle” has capability to intercept and engage in air-to-air combat planes intruding in Philippine airspace.
This was stressed by PAF chief Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Delgado during the sidelights of the turnover of eight brand-new Bell-412EPs and two attack versions of the AgustaWestland AW-109Es Monday at Villamor Air Base, Pasay City.
“The aircraft that we’ll be getting (F/A-50s), has the capability to intercept and engage in air-to-air (missions) or in a dog fight” he added.
But despite these advanced capabilities, Delgado said the F/A-50s is but a transition aircraft and will be utilized by the PAF in training the next generation of Filipino fighter pilots.
“We consider it a transition aircraft, and hopefully by the time, in the next few years we will come up with a more advance aircraft,” the PAF chief stressed.
Two F/A-50 units are scheduled to be delivered to the PAF before the end of the year.
The Philippines has 12 F/A-50 order from Korea Aerospace Industries worth Php18.9 billion.
The F/A-50 has a top speed of Mach 1.5 or one and a half times the speed of sound and is capable of being fitted air-to-air missiles, including the AIM-9 “Sidewinder” air-to-air and heat-seeking missiles aside from light automatic cannons.
The F/A-50 will act as the country’s interim fighter until the Philippines get enough experience of operating fast jet assets and money to fund the acquisition of more capable fighter aircraft.
The F/A-50 design is largely derived from the F-16 “Fighting Falcon”, and they have many similarities: use of a single engine, speed, size, cost, and the range of weapons.
KAI’s previous engineering experience in license-producing the KF-16 was a starting point for the development of the F/A-50.
The aircraft can carry two pilots in tandem seating. The high-mounted canopy developed by Hankuk Fiber is applied with stretched acrylic, providing the pilots with good visibility, and has been tested to offer the canopy with ballistic protection against four-pound objects impacting at 400 knots.
The altitude limit is 14,600 meters (48,000 feet), and airframe is designed to last 8,000 hours of service.
There are seven internal fuel tanks with capacity of 2,655 liters (701 US gallons), five in the fuselage and two in the wings.
An additional 1,710 liters (452 US gallons) of fuel can be carried in the three external fuel tanks.
Trainer variants have a paint scheme of white and red, and aerobatic variants white, black, and yellow.
The F/A-50 uses a single General Electric F404-102 turbofan engine license-produced by Samsung Techwin, upgraded with a full authority digital engine control system jointly developed by General Electric and Korean Aerospace Industries.
The engine consists of three-staged fans, seven axial stage arrangement, and an afterburner.
Its engine produces a maximum of 78.7 kN (17,700 lbf) of thrust with afterburner.
Picture image credit to s3.zetaoards
- pna.gov
