The FAB (Brazilian Air Force) successfully launched a missile using its new fighter, the Swedish Saab Gripen. It was fired on Thursday (27), costing an estimated R$12.4 million, against a drone near the coast of Rio Grande do Norte.
Now, the FAB will carry out a similar test with the German Gripen’s 27 mm cannon in a test at sea near Rio. With this and the flight by the Force’s KC-390s, at the beginning of this month, the plane will finalize its certification to enter real combat in 2026.
The launch was the highlight of the BVR-X exercise, which began on the 17th in Natal. The test takes its acronym from the Meteor’s characteristic: beyond the visual field, in the English acronym, while the X indicates experimental. Previously, the missile had only been tested with the Gripen in Sweden.
at a distance that can vary from 100 km to 200 km from its target, and may or may not update its route via digital connection along the way, leaving little reaction time for the adversary.
In this case, a drone from the Italian manufacturer Leonardo, the Mirach 100/5, was used, which simulated maneuvers like a small subsonic fighter. No operational details of the test, such as the distance between the fighter and the target, were disclosed.
“The launch was the perfect scenario to verify and test how efficient the Gripen and Meteor binomial are in modern air warfare and against any type of vector”, the commander of the Natal Air Base, Brigadier Breno Diogenes Gonçalves.
The Meteor is the most advanced model of its type on the market, of a more recent generation than the models of its type in Latin America, the American AIM-120C used by Chile and the Russian R-77, operated by Peru and Venezuela. Brazil had nothing like it.
The Gripen can carry up to seven of these missiles, which employ a fuel propulsion phase followed by the use of air feed in front to generate speeds up to four times that of sound (4,900 km/h).
According to (International Peace Research Institute), the FAB purchase was worth €200 million (around R$1.2 billion today) for a total of one hundred units. This is in line with the price quoted on the market for the Meteor, which can reach €2.4 million per piece (R$14.9 million).
The Force reveals neither cost nor quantities. The purchase of the weapon is part of Gripen, which already has 11 of the 36 aircraft ordered in 2014 in Brazil. There are billion-dollar annual disbursements for the program, which is supported by the Swedish government, but it is behind schedule.
According to the initial schedule, the fighters were due last year, including the 15 scheduled to be produced on the Embraer line in Gavião Peixoto (SP). The current forecast is for final delivery in 2032, and the first fighter made in Brazil should be presented by the end of the year.
With this, the FAB is negotiating the possibility of purchasing a batch of up to 12 Gripen of the previous generation, the C/D, in operation in . The idea is to fill a hole in the fleet, particularly due to the end of life of the AMX ground attack aircraft, based in Santa Maria (RS), which should occur soon.
The problem is that the Gripen is in high demand, being desired by those at war. Furthermore, Stockholm does not want to overly strip its airspace in times of high tension with .
The model purchased by Brazil, generation E (one pilot)/F (two occupants), was also ordered by Sweden, Thailand and Colombia — in the Brazilian line, which is jointly operated by Saab and Embraer. Peru will also be able to choose the aircraft, but the country’s perennial political crisis is delaying the decision.
The FAB did not say whether it will test the other missile operated by the Brazilian Gripen, the German-Italian Iris-T. short-range, around 25 km, guided by an infrared sensor that searches for the target’s heat signature, such as the gases from its engine.
There are no details of how many were purchased and at what price, but their shelf value is estimated at €380,000 (R$2.3 million) per unit.
