As predicted by PSF a few days ago, the Pakistan Navy has officially disclosed that the aircraft selected for their Long-Range Maritime Patrol Aircraft (LRMPA) mission is the Embraer Lineage 1000E.
After wide-ranging and very extensive modifications, the Lineage 1000E will become the Pakistan Navy ‘Sea Sultan’ jet-powered LR-MPA, designed specifically for Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) as well as ISR, ASuW, ELINT, ESM, C2 and SAR.
Ten aircraft will be ordered and the contract for 1 has already been completed and the aircraft has been ordered.
The modifications will most probably be done by Rhienmetall Air Service (Germany), which also modified the ATR-72 commercial aircraft into the RAS-72 Sea Eagle MPA for the Pakistan Navy.
The Sea Sultan will also see similar modifications to the Pakistan Navy RAS-72 Sea Eagle but with a much longer range, longer endurance, more payload, more subsystems and external hardpoints as well as internal stores dropped via bomb-bay doors.
The Embraer Lineage 1000E has an 8500 km range, Mach 0.82 max speed, 41000 ft service ceiling and a 120,000 lb. MTOW.
The unit cost will be around $50 million but with the upgrades and modifications will cost around $80-90 million flyaway cost.
Specifications/Systems of Pakistan Navy’s Embraer Lineage 1000E MPA
To get an idea of the type of subsystems on the RAS 72-Sea Eagle has, read the following article.
Pakistan Navy’s RAS ATR-72 Sea Eagle MPA: https://pakstrategic.com/2020/10/21/pakistan-navys-ras-atr-72-sea-eagle-mpa/
Pakistan Navy’s Embraer Lineage 1000E MPA will also feature somewhat similar systems.
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