Nigeria Requesting Permission to Purchase Textron Scorpion Light Attack Fighter

Nigeria's air force has expressed an interest in acquiring the Textron AirLand Scorpion strike and surveillance aircraft in order to counter the Boko Haram Islamist insurgency in the country.

The service currently operates both dedicated strike and surveillance types – the Chengdu F-7Ni and ATR 42, respectively – but believes that a low-cost aircraft with a dual capability would enable quicker and more precise counter-insurgency operations.

“In my country, we want and need this,” AVM RA Ojuawo, director of operations representing CAS, Nigerian air force headquarters, told the International Fighter conference in London on 18 November. “We want this equipment, but are they going to give it to us?”

Ojuawo says Abuja will soon put in a request to the US government for the sale of up to a squadron’s worth of aircraft. However, it worries that approval may not be granted, based on the previous rejection of its appeal for Bell Helicopters AH-1 Cobra rotorcraft.

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Textron Preparing for Scorpion Light Attack Jet Manufacturing

Textron AirLand has started making preliminary decisions ahead of launching the production phase of the light attack and reconnaissance Scorpion jet.

A formal production launch depends on signing the first order, but Textron AirLand is already selecting suppliers for the production phase, a spokesman says.

Honeywell has been selected to deliver a turbofan engine – the TFE731-40AR-3S – for the twinjet. It is the same engine currently powering the developmental prototype.

In September, Textron Aviation chief executive Scott Ernest said a launch order for the Scorpion could be announced by the end of this year.

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Textron Wins Contract for Mine-hunting Unmanned Surface Vehicle From US Navy

A division of Textron Systems has won a $33.8 million Navy contract for an unmanned surface vehicle designed to sweep for acoustic and magnetic mines from the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), company officials told USNI News last week.

The Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS previously known as the unmanned surface sweep system or USSS) is planned for the Mine Countermeasure (MCM) mission package planned for the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS).

The USV is designed to methodically sweep a patch of ocean towing a cable designed to trigger so-called influence mines — mines that activate when they detect sounds or magnetic signatures that correspond to those of a large ship.

“It’s a cable that you tow behind the USV,” Rear Adm. John Ailes, former program manager for LCS Mission Modules, told USNI News in 2013.

“It provided both acoustic — making noise like a ship — and the magnetic signature of a ship… It tells the mines, ‘I’m a ship, you should blow up’.”

UISS is based on Textron Systems Unmanned Systems’ Common Unmanned Surface Vessel (CUSV) the company has been testing for years, Bill Leonard of Textron Systems Unmanned Systems told USNI News.

“We started doing all of our lessons learned and came up with a fourth generation of our CUSV,” Leonard said.

“We made improvements to the hull form, we made the payload bay larger. Got a new propulsion system and just various other improvements that we’ve learned over the five or six years we’ve been doing this and that translate over to the Navy program.”

Textron now has two years to finalize the development of the UISS before a 2017 test of the MCM package.

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Textron AirLand to Offer Scorpion Variant for US Air Force T-X Trainer

Textron AirLand plans to enter a modified version of its Scorpion aircraft into the US Air Force’s T-X trainer replacement competition, a top company official said.

The company is also eyeing the international training market as an area of growth for its jet, which is still working on signing its first customer.

Textron executives have largely danced around the question of whether the Scorpion would enter the T-X competition, hinting it was under consideration but not giving confirmation. The comments from Stephen Burke, regional vice president for military business development at Textron AirLand, were the clearest and most decisive made by an executive about plans to enter the trainer market.

“We will compete for T-X,” Burke told Defense News Aug. 23 at the National Guard Association of the United States annual conference in Chicago.

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Bill Sweetman Takes a Look at Textron's Scorpion

My first reaction to photos of the Textron Airland Scorpion was not positive, I will admit. The tandem cockpit, twin canted vertical stabilizers and slender straight wing made it look too much like a Citation wearing a Super Hornet costume for Halloween.

From an operational viewpoint, it seemed to be at risk of falling between two stools: not that much more survivable than a light attack aircraft in the AT-6 or Tucano class, and, in a reconnaissance mission, able to carry the same kind of sensors as a special-mission King Air, but more expensive to buy and fly, and with one very busy weapon-systems operator in the rear seat.

Before I went to Farnborough, I ran those twin tails past some people I know who really design airplanes. The Scorpion passed this test: The fuselage was wide enough, I was told, to cause problems with body slipstream blanketing the tail at high angles of attack. Two tails could be lighter than the tall single fin that would be required to get some fin area above the body wake. (I’m looking at you, M-346.)

Next, it was a matter of venturing to the Textron display, located somewhere in Surrey, to talk to Textron Airland’s president, Bill Anderson, and chief engineer, Dale Tutt.

In person, the Scorpion is quite big. At 21,250 lb. max takeoff weight, it is about the size of the M-346 or a Citation Excel, it carries a 9,300 lb. useful load, and it stands well clear of the ground. As a jet, it offers much greater speed and altitude capability than a King Air or AT-6, Anderson points out.

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First Flight of the Scorpion (With Video)

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Video of Textron's Scorpion Jet's Taxi Test

Report: Textron Scorpion Light Attack Jet to Have First Flight Next Week

Textron is planning for first flight of its self-funded Scorpion light attack/ISR collector as early as next week, program sources say.

Textron & AirLand Unveil the Scorpion: A New, Cleansheet American Light Attack Fighter

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