Come fly WORDS AND PHOTOS BRIAN HARTIGAN
The Boeing E-7A Wedgetail’s relatively small cockpit has just one spare seat – and even that is only a simple foldout padded slab in the doorway. Yet, being positioned in the doorway, slap bang on the centreline of the aircraft, and slightly elevated compared to the captain on the left and his co-ie on the right, it is without doubt the best visitor’s seat in the house.
And I feel immensely privileged to be sitting here as E-7A Wedgetail A30001 trundles down the taxiway for takeoff on runway three-zero at RAAF Base Williamtown, New South Wales. Even more privileged that I am the first reporter ever allowed aboard for a live training mission with Australia’s newest and most capable intelligence platform. In the last issue of CONTACT, I outlined in some detail how the Royal Australian Air Force’s Wedgetail Early Warning and Control aircraft is the darling of the armada of air assets arranged by our coalition partners in the fight against ISIS in Iraq. This issue I want to give you a much more personal tour of this distinctive aircraft. Many of you will have seen a Boeing 737 at some stage. As the
Aircraft captain Squadron Leader Glenn ‘Fish’ Salmon (left) and co-pilot Flight Lieutenant Paul ‘Pip’ Pippia at the controls of an E7/A Wedgetail 001 during takeoff from RAAF Base Williamtown, near Newcastle, NSW, for an F/A-18 training-support mission.
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