(Image: Richard E. Flagg/UK Airfields; Eurofighter Typhoon test rig JP098)
You won’t find many seemingly redundant Eurofighter Typhoon fuselages in outside storage. Even the defunct wreck of 11 Squadron Typhoon ZJ943/DK is tucked away quietly out of sight at RAF Shawbury (though its tail fin seems to have become something of a feature in 11 Sqn’s picnic area). The unfinished ‘aircraft’ shown above, however, is slightly different.
Identified by the serial number JP098, this Eurofighter Typhoon fuselage is actually a non-flying test rig. Despite being a real fuselage, JP098 was never intended for flight and instead served as a wing attachment trials article at EADS Munich in Germany.
The bare, unfinished shell was delivered to RAF St Athan in Wales during July 2002, where it was used by the Battle Damage Repair (BDR) School (see below) along with a number of other decommissioned jets, including a Tornado GR1 and F2, as well as grounded Harriers and Jaguars.
(Image: KeithM3; Typhoon JP098 seen at St Athan’s BDR school in 2002)
According to the South Wales Aviation Group website, JP098 was later transferred to St Athan’s Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) School. The article was last noted in open storage (top) in September 2014. Though its empty cockpit was latterly seen covered by a tarpaulin, the photograph above by KeithM3 suggests that JP098 may have been actively used for BDR training, ensuring engineers and technicians are skilled in the art of keeping damaged aircraft serviceable under wartime conditions.
For those interested in how battle damage repair works in practice, the video below shows a BDR exercise using an RAF Blackburn Buccaneer.
Related – A Different Kind of Aircraft Graveyard: Fatigue Test Airframes at Paine Field, Washington
The post JP098: Non-Flying Eurofighter Typhoon Test Rig Fuselage at St Athan appeared first on Urban Ghosts Media.