Heads up for the UK members

a reply to: Silentvulcan

defense-update.com...

Off topic but be aware there's a load of 'fluffy white iridescent' tree pollen floating around in NW UK today - Saw a couple shoot past before which were seemingly moving in vectors far too fast to be a bird which caught my eye then an hour or so later three more 'objects' started floating by - I was about to post here and say I'm pretty sure there's something being tested high altitude over Warton area (main research craft runway/base, it's busy at the moment) but could still be an optical illusion then one of the wee buggers flew out of sunlight, revealed itself and made me feel a right cretin.

Still an incredibly convincing illusion when the viewing angle leaves only clear blue sky as a background, what seemed to be multiple passes and a flyby in formation at at least 40,000+ around personal jet size was just a bit of fluffy pollen (horsestail, horsesmane rings a bell) floating at around 20ft in the end.

The second batch of five aircraft are scheduled for Tuesday, July 31st. No ETA, but probably similar to the first flight.

There will also be a fifth gen deployment to Italy, or possibly Norway before the end of summer. They haven't specified much beyond "they're deploying before the end of summer".

a reply to: Zaphod58

How many are we scheduled for this year Zaph?

a reply to: Woody510

They plan to declare IOC at the end of the year. That means a set number of aircraft, but they haven't said how many that requires. From the information I have found though, it looks like 9 this year. There are 15 delivered in the US so far.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Cool cheers Zaph the answers are always much appreciated. Can't wait to the B's flying some exercises up in the Lakes.

Ascot 9302, ZZ333 and Ascot 9301, ZZ334 departed to the US from the UK to pick up the five aircraft Tuesday.

They were delayed for an undisclosed reason, so they're trying again tomorrow.

ZZ336 as Ascot 9303 headed towards the US this morning. He'll be part of the drag tomorrow. Looks like one returned to the UK yesterday.

Five more F-35s enroute. ZZ333 split off into Canada, meanwhile the others are out over the Atlantic on their way. ETA was set for 1830 GMT but looks like they're about 2 hours late.

Five F-35s, with tanker, and Tornado escorts landed at Marham about 45 minutes ago.

m.youtube.com...#

Nice video of the trip over the pond.

Twelve F-22s begin a three week deployment to Germany, Wednesday the 8th. Four tankers that are with them will redeploy to Mildenhall.

Six aircraft arrived, operating as TREND51 and flight. No word in when the other 6 will arrive. They'll be traveling around to train with NATO members.

A couple pretty big announcements this week. Lossiemouth will be home to a group of US Navy P-8As, and Lakenheath just got $150M in new construction for the F-35A.

a reply to: Zaphod58
When you say new construction do you mean like new facilities to accommodate the F-35? Meaning that they can be stationed there ? As for the P-8s what time frame we looking at for the RAF to receive theirs

a reply to: ThePeaceMaker

They're getting F-35s to Lakenheath. This is to build the facilities to bed them down and support them. A total of 54 F-35As will start arriving in 2021, and all will be there by 2023.

The first UK P-8 will be signed over some time around November of next year. I believe it stays in the US for a short transition period for crews to familiarize with it, then heads to Lossiemouth.

a reply to: Zaphod58
Nice so I'm going to have the RAF B's and US A's stationed not far from me. I need to start finding time to start visiting the bases

Four U-2S went through Fairford this week. One may still be there, as it had a maintenance issue.