Article Posted on : - Jul 01, 2010

A Tornado GR fighter aircraft. A UK MoD photo

WARTON, UK (BNS): The UK Ministry of Defence has awarded a £8.6 million ($12.82 mn) contract to BAE Systems to equip the Royal Air Force’s Tornado GR4 fleet of fighter aircraft with Brimstone missiles.

The twin-engine combat aircraft will deploy the Insensitive Munition (IM) variant of the dual mode Brimstone guided missile which will provide it precision attack capability against manoeuvring and fixed targets, BAE said.

A series of flight trials which will commence in 2011 will be carried out at BAE Systems Warton site to provide the necessary evidence to clear the Tornado GR4s to carry and deploy this weapon, the company said.

The Tornado GR4 day or night, all-weather attack aircraft is capable of delivering a wide variety of weapons. The aircraft's major weapons suite includes laser guided bombs, cluster bombs, air launched anti- radiation missile (ALARM), Sidewinder short-range air-to-air missiles and Storm Shadow missile.

Brimstone is an autonomous air-to-surface missile that independently locates, tracks and engages fixed and moving targets day or night in any weather. The fire-and-forget principle of the missile allows it to engage targets from standoff ranges.

The deployment of the missile in Tornado GR4s will provide the aircraft with an effective anti-armour weapon.