Boeing has completed the first flight of the UK's E-7 Wedgetail for the Royal Air Force (RAF).
A Boeing flight-test crew conducted functional checks during the first flight from Birmingham Airport, marking a significant milestone in the program's test and evaluation phase.
Currently unpainted, the aircraft is one of three 737 NG aircraft on British soil undergoing modification by a highly skilled team of over 100 people at STS Aviation Services in Birmingham.
The combat-proven E-7 detects and identifies adversarial targets at long range and tracks multiple airborne and maritime threats simultaneously with 360-degree coverage via the Multi-role Electronically Scanned Array (MESA) sensor. It provides the warfighter with critical multi-domain awareness and command-and-control decision advantage.
The future UK E-7 fleet will operate from RAF Lossiemouth in Scotland, where Boeing's local suppliers and contractors are nearing completion of the infrastructure facilities to support its introduction into service.
The RAF participates in a tri-lateral agreement with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and U.S. Air Force (USAF) toward cooperative Wedgetail interoperability, capability development, evaluation and testing, sustainment, operations, training, and safety.
The RAAF, the Republic of Korea Air Force, and the Turkish Air Force currently operate the E-7. Boeing is also building two rapid prototype E-7 aircraft for USAF and in 2023, NATO announced the selection of the E-7 for its AEW&C mission. The growing global E-7 fleet provides mission systems interoperability, mission readiness and lifecycle cost advantages, as well as a common technical growth path to stay ahead of global threats.
Later this autumn, following a series of flight tests and further evaluation, the aircraft will depart to a paint facility to receive its RAF livery.
