Additional Gripens arrive 2 x 2
Date: 28 May 2010
By Dean Wingrin
The SAAF received a additional four new Gripen C fighter aircraft today.
Arriving on board the cargo vessel Achtergracht (registered in Amsterdam) yesterday, two aircraft were offloaded in Table Bay Harbour on Thursday and the other two were offloaded this morning. They had been loaded onboard the vessel at the port of Norrkoping in Sweden.
The single seat aircraft, serials 3912 to 3915, were towed the 8km from the harbour to AFB Ysterplaat in two convoys of two aircraft each, one on Thursday and the other this morning. They will be made ready for flight at the airforce base prior to departure.
With all nine dual-seat Gripen D aircraft already delivered, these four aircraft will join the first two Gripen Cs that arrived on 11 February this year. The Gripen will play a key part in the air force's plans to safeguard the airspace above the stadiums during the 2010 Soccer World Cup.
The original order was for nine Gripen D dual-seat and 19 Gripen C single-seat aircraft. However, the order was revised in 2005 to nine dual-seat and seventeen single-seat aircraft. The first instrumented Gripen D was delivered in April 2008 and is based at the SAAF's Test flight and Development Centre near Bredasdorp in the southern Cape. The balance of the aircraft is assigned to 2 Squadron at AFB Makhado in the Limpopo province.
