HALO in the Skies - Britains Attempt at Stealth Technology

The once mighty British Royal Air Force Base at Warton, home to major elements of the British Royal Air Force during World War II, is now a development and testing facility for the BAE System Corporation, the last of Great Britain’s biggest aircraft design and developmental companies. Warton’s runways had been proving ground for some of Britain’s greatest aircrafts of the last four decades. The venerable close-support bomber Canberra, the Lightning, the BAE’s Hawk and the Panavia’s Tornado fighter-bomber, all first took to the air from Warton’s runways. The final Tornado left Warton in the summer of 1998, a GR1 model whose destiny would be the Royal Saudi Air Force. These days, Warton is used for several purposes by the Royal Air Force. Part of the base is being designated to be the final assembly stop for Europe’s next generation air-superiority fighter, the Typhoon.

The base also accommodates major elements of Britain’s air defense system. Warton would be the home to the two initially deployed Typhoon squadrons, the No. 29 and No. 17. In addition, Warton was utilized as a test bed for the newly improved Nimrod MRA4 maritime reconnaissance aircraft. Eventually, the Nimrod would be based at RAF Kinloss in Moray. But the base’s main function in Britain’s aircraft development program is that of a testing facility for new technology. The current technology being tested at Warton is rumored to be England’s first true and indigenous Stealth Airplane.

Between the years of 1992 and 1994, the British government invested the amount of 100 million pounds to research the feasibility of developing a workable stealth fighter program. Following the recommendations of a formal feasibility study in early 1997, BAE urged the government in London to start a crash-course program for the design and production of Britain’s first stealth plane. This generates the first recorded data about a stealth program in the UK. The idea, as rumor has it, is that Great Britain, having observed the low operational capability of its Tornado fleet in Desert Storm (1991), decided that a replacement, a stealth fighter was needed to maintain air superiority over non-power dominated areas. Late in 1992, it was reported by some media outlets that the RAF was hard at work, fielding a Stealth Technology Demonstrator Aircraft that should had been ready by the end of the 1990s.

It’s known that RAF second generation Tornados had been testing Radar Absorbing Materials since the middle of 1991. HALO, or High Altitude Low Observables, is the name assigned by many to Britain’s effort to develop and produce a front-line stealth fighter-bomber. Most aviation experts believe that the HALO program closely resembled that of the United States Navy’s A-12 Stealth Bomber. The program was “officially” cancelled in the mid 1990s. All of this is in the background of “small silver flying triangle” sightings all over the southern coast of England since 2000. Can Britain be in the midst of developing an indigenous stealth platform?

An article by Raul Colon: rcolonfrias@yahoo.com

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