This article is published in Aerospace Daily & Defense Report part of Aviation Week Intelligence Network (AWIN), and is complimentary through Aug 24, 2026. For information on becoming an AWIN Member to access more content like this, click here.
LONDON—Loyal Farnborough Airshow attendees will remember the gathering a decade ago when a storm front brought torrential rain, forcing an early end to one of the trade days.
There is a different kind of storm brewing for this year’s iteration of the biennial get-together that kicks off July 20. It has been preceded by a storm front of weapons announcements. Air Chief Marshal Harv Smyth told Aviation Week the country’s collaborative combat aircraft (CCA) program is now on a fast track. A vehicle, now referred to as Storm Fighter, is due to fly in 2028, the Royal Air Force (RAF) boss said in the interview.
Storm Fighter is supposed to work with the future fighter the U.K. is developing in cooperation with Japan and Italy. Once the aircraft the UK calls Tempest is ready, the RAF expects to be on its seventh iteration of CCA.
Farnborough may unearth more detail of what the Storm Fighter will be, with other potential candidates also promoting their products for the growing European interest in CCAs. The Boeing MQ-28 Ghost Bat, for instance, will be on static display.
But Smyth also revealed two other RAF efforts: a long-range electronic warfare drone called Storm Chrome and a low-cost 1,000-mi.-range missile called Storm Fire. More details on those may also emerge at Farnborough.
The confab also could provide further detail on the UK’s Project Nyx after the British Army in May chose Anduril Industries, BAE Systems, Tekever and Thales to work on the demonstrator program for a system to operate alongside its Boeing Apaches.
There are other likely newcomers to Farnborough. Honeywell Aerospace is showing up in a new guise, marking its first airshow outing since the separation of its non-aerospace and defense activities. Leonardo will arrive with a new CEO, albeit an airshow veteran. A new British prime minister, Andy Burnham, is set to move into his official residence at No. 10 Downing Street as the show opens and is expected to make the trek out to the event before all is said and done.
There are other debut performances set for the event. Destinus, for instance, plans to show a new weapon, and Bombardier will be flying its Global 8000 that is already gaining traction as a future military platform.
Eyes will also be on some trainer aircraft jockeying, with the recent release of the UK Defense Investment Plan that funds a new Jet Training System to replace the BAE Systems' Hawks. The Leonardo M346 will be there, as well as a Turkish Aerospace Hurjet mock-up and a model of the Boeing T-7.
The noise in the sky might not be distant thunder, of course—but rather, the rumbling of the United Arab Emirates’s Fursan Al Emarat display team, with its Hongdu L-15As, and the U.S. Air Force F-35A demo squad.
No doubt by the time Thursday rolls around, people's minds will turn to another tempest, invoking what the Bard expressed so acutely: “O, I have suffered. With those that I saw suffer.”
(Public service announcement: The current forecast is for only a small chance of rain on July 22, but this is England, after all.)
Related Content
