FARNBOROUGH — BAE Systems today revealed the Brontanax, a new collaborative combat aircraft (CCA) loyal wingman drone designed for use by the United Kingdom.
The drone, roughly the size of a BAE Hawk trainer jet, was unveiled with newly-installed Defence Secretary Wes Streeting at hand during the third day of the Farnborough Airshow.
Brontanax is “intended to provide electronic warfare and precision strike capabilities against airborne and ground targets,” per a company release. Its release comes days after British officials announced a plan for UK-developed CCAs under the “Storm Fighter” moniker.
Streeting hailed the unveiling of Brontanax or Thunder King as a “groundbreaking moment” for British defense, “not just for air power, but for reindustrialisation.” The launch of the aircraft demonstrates that “UK industry is at the forefront of innovation,” he added.
Brontanax is BAE’s answer to the UK’s Storm Fighter CAA program, announced last week at the Global Air and Space Chiefs Conference. “We will adopt this [Brontanax] as our operational concept demonstrator, and we’re going to get it in the air in 2027,” said Streeting.
Accompanying the Defence Secretary on stage, Air Chief Marshall Harv Smyth, UK Chief of the Air Staff said that the Brontanax reveal was a “historic moment” and fits within a wider Royal Air Force strategy to become “Europe’s first sixth-generation air force.”
Smyth noted that launch of the drone represents a “pivot towards sixth-generation air power, where uncrewed air systems integrate seamlessly with our crude platforms, exponentially increasing our survivability, our lethality, and ultimately our conventional deterrence.”
Addressing the importance of the Storm Fighter CCA effort, he added that it will “markedly shift the economic calculus back in our favor, absorbing risk and enabling our crewed platforms to more readily survive.”
Those remarks come after the UK’s Defence Investment Plan committed £300 million to the development of CCAs to fly alongside British Eurofighter Typhoon fourth generation and F-35 fifth generation fighter jets. In parallel, the document also stresses that the UK is establishing a “pathway” for the loyal wingmen types to be introduced under the trilateral Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), based on development of a sixth generation fighter.
BAE executives told reporters today that Brontanax could play a role in NATO’s exercise Steadfast Defender before the end of the year and that the drone’s internal weapons bay is compatible with all weapons currently in service with the RAF.
Simon Barnes, BAE Systems Group Managing Director for Air Systems, said that the manufacturer decided to self-fund Brontanax, through an outlay of several hundred million pounds, in order to “be ready at the time of need, rather than wait” for the UK or other potential customers.
“It looks like a demonstrator is the next step [for Storm Fighter], which we’re ready for,” he added. “We’re looking forward to flying next year, and that I think is the big proof of concept, to be able to show that a large uncrewed combat air platform can fly in UK airspace and start to fulfill some of the roles that the RAF have got planned.”
Concepting of the aircraft first started in 2022 and involved an 18 month period where BAE drew on requirements and operational analysis “to try and come up with a solution that we feel matches the balance of survivability, performance, affordability, and deployability,” according to David Holmes, Managing Director of FalconWorks, BAE Systems rapid prototyping arm. He also said that the aircraft could offer an aircraft carrier capability, based on simulation and integration analysis.
“This is not a demonstrator,” he added. “We will be demonstrating with it, but it is set up as a production facility or a production line, and our vision is that we see these [Brontanax CCA’s] filling requirements not only in the UK, of course, with a sovereign provider,” but with international allies too.
In the more immediate term, Steadfast Defender is an “opportunity” to prove that Brontanax and RAF Eurofighter aircraft can work collaboratively and validate a “real operational capability,” said Jerry Mayhew, BAE Systems senior military advisor. He also noted that a graphic depicting one Eurofighter Typhoon and a swarm of four Brontanax drones was “indicative” of a future mission.
At a subsystems level, the Brontanax demonstrator has been fitted with a Williams produced engine, but a longer term solution is based on integration of Rolls Royce’s Orpheus powerplant family. Holmes noted that Rolls Royce, “understand the requirements” regarding engine developments.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
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