Article Posted on : - May 09, 2013

FA-50 aircraft. Photo: KAI.

SEOUL (BNS): Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) has recently concluded the contract for mass production of the FA-50, amounting to approximately 1.1 trillion which was won with the Defence Acquisition Programme Administration (DAPA).

In accordance with the contract, subsequent to the first mass production contract which was signed on 2011, KAI plans to deploy the aircraft (first production portion) for preparing for the actual battle beginning in August and seek its entire force integration until 2016.

The FA-50 is a light combat aircraft which was developed based on the T-50, a supersonic advanced trainer in order to replace the military's superannuated fighters, like the F-5E/Fs and A-37s.

The FA-50 combat aircraft is able to load up to 4.5 tonnes of weapons including the basic weapons like air-to-air/air-to-surface missiles and machine guns as well as precision guidance bombers such as JDAMs, or joint direct attack munitions and multi-purpose precision guidance CBUs (or cluster bomb units).

Also, the FA-50 fighter, complete with a night vision apparatus, has a mission capability both in the daytime and in the night time and boasts its improved self-protection ability for the aircraft itself.