
German Air Force Typhoon and private Lear Jet involved in a mid-air in Germany.
A Lear Jet with two people on board has crashed after colliding mid-air with a German Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon over Olsberg, in Germany.
The Learjet was a target plane operated by the “Gesellschaft für Flugzieldarstellung” (GFD), a civilian company cooperating with the German Air Force for air targeting exercises.
The Eurofighter involved in the collision was operating with another aircraft of the same type within a Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) training, in which the Eurofighters intercepted the Learjet.
The military jet reportedly safely landed at Nörvenich air base whereas the private owned plane crashed in an unpopulated area. The two on board the Lear Jet are feared dead.
Image credit: Eurofighter
The Lear Jet was the “target” for the Eurofighter, this was part of the exercise. The plane belonged to the “GFD Gesellschaft für Flugzieldarstellung” (Target Towing Association Inc: http://www.checksix.de/html/gfd.html)
Since the learjet in question was part of a QRA training sortie, ATC and separation to civilian planes had nothing to do with this….
If the aircraft was indeed acting as a practice target for a QRA two-ship, the aircraft parttaking in the sortie would eventually end up quite close, a bit to close this time.
Well we now know the typhoon is hard to kill, so, victory for the typhoon?