Defensie wil huidige F-16’s vanaf 2023 uit roulatie halen

Defensie is van plan in 2023 te starten met het geleidelijk uit roulatie halen van de huidige F-16’s. Dat heeft minister van Defensie Pieter De Crem (CD&V) woensdag gezegd in de Kamer.

De Crem kreeg er vragen over het Wikileaks-bericht waaruit bleek dat hij interesse heeft voor een aankoop "off the shelf" van een reeks F-35’s uit het "Joint Strike Fighter"-programma van enkele Belgische bondgenoten.

Het militaire constructieprogramma in kwestie vloeit voort uit de samenwerking van de VS met onder meer het Verenigd Koninkrijk, Italië, Nederland en Noorwegen. België besliste destijds niet mee te stappen in het project, maar intussen nadert stilaan het levenseinde voor de bestaande straaljagervloot.

Volgens een Amerikaanse vertrouwelijke documenten van 16 oktober 2009 overwoog De Crem daarom alsnog een reeks F-35’s uit het programma aan te kopen, maar weliswaar pas na hun ontwikkeling. Ook Nederland en Noorwegen hebben al laten weten "dat ze niet zullen beslissen over de aankoop en productie van een reeks F-35’s voor 2014", merkte De Crem woensdag op.

In zijn antwoord op vragen van Kamerleden Karolien Grosemans (N-VA), David Geerts (sp.a), Wouter De Vriendt (Groen!) en Denis Ducarme (MR) maakte de minister duidelijk dat er nog tijd is voor een Belgische beslissing. Voor de hele procedure van aankoop, onderhandelingen en bouw van de toestellen rekent hij op acht à tien jaar.

Source: De Standaard

TV Show 75 Years SPITFIRE BBC2 October 22th 2011 (

Thx Didier & Jules

Via Paul B. :

Some interesting programs on BBC2 on Saturday Oct 22nd:

 
14H50 The First of the Few (1942) : 71st anniversary of the Battle of Britain.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00cgtr4


Biopic that chronicles the true story of how two of the most remarkable men in aviation history - visionary Spitfire designer RJ Mitchell and his test pilot Geoffrey Crisp - designed a streamlined monoplane that led to the development of the Spitfire. BBC TV Guide

20H15 Spitfire Women : British female pilots during WWII. 

Duration: 1 hour. During World War Two, a remarkable band of female pilots fought against all odds for the right to aid the war effort. Without these Spitfire Women the war may never have been won. These trailblazers were part of the Air Transport Auxillary, a thousand-strong organisation that delivered aircraft ...> Show more

Saturday 18:45 BBC Two only on England, Northern Ireland, Wales

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00tw1m1

21H45 The Spitfire : Britain's Flying Past : 75 years Spitfire by Eoin O'Shea.

Passionate flying enthusiast and broadcaster John Sergeant celebrates the 75th anniversary of the Spitfire with a TV love letter to this most British triumph of design and endeavour. The film follows the story of a Spitfire from birth to retirement and tells the stories of ordinary people with extraordinary tales. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0153yb6

23H30 First Flight : Geoffrey Wellum, one of the youngest Spitfire pilots during WWII.

Drama-documentary.
At the age of just 18, Geoffrey Wellum was one of the youngest Spitfire pilots to go into combat in the Battle of Britain. A boy, barely out of school, he was determined to fight for survival. The price of victory was more than he could bear. Seventy years later, that same boy is still yearning to be free. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00ttjz0

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: VTB Secretary

For really motivated peoples : New release: Sopwith Camel & Pup engineering 1916 - 1918

Hello,
Sometime, we get requests to share for free technical information to repair, restore or rebuild aircraft.
Here is a good example of the how much cost the preservation and knowledge.

You can buy 200 drawings about the Sopwith Camel and 350 drawings about the Sopwith Pup for 179 Australian Dollars.

You can imagine this is expensive but this nothing if you count the time needed to find, finely scans, restore in some case and (the more consuming) index so much rare documents.

Last but not least take in account the investment in hardware (PC, scanners, DVDwriter, software) and expertise (how to handle such document, check the quality of the scans, store them for the new generations).

Some of us did it for Renard documents and I think to have a realistic figure of how much hours were needed is impossibble.

To have purchased technical manuals from this source ans others, I can guarantee I appreciate the time, dedication ... and the costs to preserve and share some rare aeronautical stuff when I got the documents I order.

So maybe next time, we ask someone of our contacts, everything for free, let's think about how much of his time, his money and his energy he needed to share with us.

170 Dollars is maybe not so much for motivated persons  and a very small participation to the preservation of Aviation Heritage..

many happy landings

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: HistoryBytesBack
Date: Wed, Oct 19, 2011 at 4:35 PM
Subject: New release: Sopwith Camel & Pup engineering 1916 - 1918

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HistoryBytesBack HistoryBytesBack Items of news: SOPWITH PUP AND CAMEL ENGINEERING: We've finished the marathon digitising project for the Sopwith Pup and Camel engineering plans. The result is here: Sopwith Camel & Pup factory engineering plans 1916 - 18 All scans are at 4000 ppi and in grey scale so that everything that is on the original is present in the scan. Bf 109 E, F, G, K ENGINEERING PLANS UPDATED: We have added 15 new manuals and 150 additional CAD drawings to the set. All are completely new. The manuals are done to our new standards - in colour, no bitmaps, they work well on iPad, iPhone and Android portable devices. The new version is here (note that we did not change the cover art this time because we like the way that it looks): Bf 109 blueprints, aircraft manuals Messerschmitt Me109 Previous purchasers, please get in contact with us for pricing info on the special update set. DOWNLOAD MANUALS: We have download versions of all of our aviation manual titles. This is an easier way to get manuals on to iPad, iPod, iPhone, Android and and internet enabled device that can read a .pdf file. We are currently using iPad in the workshop and it is a big help when we need to get information to the job at hand. It beats paper and lap tops hands down. Here's a quick list of manuals for download. If you don't see it there, just ask and we'll sort it for you. Previous purchasers, please get in contact with us for pricing info on the special update set. DOWNLOAD PHOTO MASTER SCANS: We've also been helping publishers and authors lately by supplying high res scans of Kodachrome slides instead of supplying photos. If you're looking for big colour photos, then any photo you've ever seen in our collection is also available as a big digital file (Multi Megabyte) - often between 40 - 50 MB. This is definitely the way to do it if you are publishing or creating new media. The Master scans are best.  P-51 A, B, C, D, H, K MUSTANG: We updated this set a couple of months ago by adding new manuals and a super high  resolution version of Roll HG. Previous customers are entitled to a discount deal in order to get the updates. This applies to all of our titles. THE NEXT SCANNING PROJECT? Let us know what you would like to see. In the mean time, browse our shop. HistoryBytesBack 8 Price Street Subiaco WA 6008 Australia

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Yves Duwelz