Dubai Airshow: All praise for Eurofighter Typhoon as UAE mulls purchase

“It’s flying with seven nations, including Saudi Arabia and Oman. It’s an aircraft that’s proven already,"says UK Royal Air Force Flight Lieutenant Jamie Norris.

Flight Lieutenant Jamie Norris said the Eurofighter Typhoon is the “easiest jet” he has ever flown. Antonie Robertson/The National
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DUBAI // The Eurofighter Typhoon is the “easiest jet” he has ever flown, a UK Royal Air Force pilot said.

Flight Lieutenant Jamie Norris said the aircraft’s computer-driven mechanism offers care-free handling and “all the power in the world to get you out of trouble”.

"It's a pilot-friendly aircraft," Lt Norris said on Tuesday at the Dubai Airshow. "The Typhoon itself is a hugely capable aircraft. There's an enormous amount of thrust for the size of the aircraft as it is, and that's the first great thing about it."

He said the UAE, which is in talks to purchase several planes, would be buying into what was essentially a world-beating aircraft.

“It’s flying with seven nations, including Saudi Arabia and Oman,” he said. “It’s an aircraft that’s proven already. It’s effective on operations, we’ve taken it to war and those seven nations trust the aircraft. So, for the UAE, I’d be really happy and I think it’s great if it goes through. Eurofighter are very happy that they’re even considered as a competitor so we’ll have to wait and see. It’s all good news.”

The Eurojet EJ200, based on Rolls Royce technology, combines a 40,000-pound thrust but weighs only 38,000 pounds fully fuelled and loaded. “It’s something that we haven’t had in many fighters to this day,” said Lt Norris, who has been flying military aircraft for 12 years. “The second thing is the carefree handling. In old aircraft devices, you use the stick and manoeuvre the aircraft really aggressively, which can over-stress the aircraft and break it if you’re not careful, and exceed the design limitations. With the Typhoon, that disappears. There are no design limitations and I can do what I want, handling the aircraft, at any time, speed or altitude.”

And its speed is impressive.

“Sitting down, we’re under 1G but when I take a tight turn with the aircraft, it takes me up to 9G so I go from weighing about 90 kilos to something like a small panda so about 800 kilos in my body,” he said. “All my internal organs weigh down about four inches and, conversely, if I push the aircraft, it’s negative 3G so it’s like being on a roller-coaster but times three.”

Pilots have to go through extensive training to fly the Typhoon.

“We start off as basic trainers,” he said. “We then go towards something more advanced like BAE Systems’ Hawk and then we’re prepared to go to the Eurofighter. We have a great simulator to practice in the safety of computers and then they put us in the real thing.”

An eight-minute flight can turn into quite the work-out.

“The experience up there is amazing, you get quite warm in the cockpit because you work so hard,” said Lt Norris. “So my eight-minute routine is like doing a half marathon for me so it’s pretty aggressive.”

cmalek@thenational.ae