The Polish Air Force nears the delivery of the first M-346 Master.
On Mar. 2, 2016, Lt. Col. Konrad Madej became the first Polish pilot to fly the Italian M-346 Master, the advanced jet trainer which is soon going to become the primary training aircraft of the Polish Air Force, replacing the TS-11 Iskra trainers.
Madej flew the jet together with a test pilot of the Finmeccanica company from Lecce-Galatina airbase in Italy, home of 212° Gruppo (Squadron) belonging to the 61° Stormo (Wing) of the Italian Air Force, the unit the operates the T-346s (this is the ItAF designation) in Italy.
Konrad Madej is the commander of the Polish 48th Training Squadron, based at the 41st Training Aviation Base in Dęblin, being a facility which cooperates with the Dęblin Air Force Academy, also known as the “School of Eaglets”.
Poland acquired 8 examples of the jet, the first four of which are already being assembled at the Venegono Superiore Finmeccanica facility.
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They are expected to be received by the Polish Air Force in November this year. Along with the Master jet, Poland also acquired the whole training program, including ground-based systems. The ground segment of the training facilities include flight-planning and mission analysis stations, mission simulator, ejection simulator, along with a computerized training system.
Meanwhile, six Polish pilots are involved in the training courses delivered by the 61° Stormo at Lecce.
After completing their M-346 training program in Italy, these pilots will become instructors at the Training Aviation Base in Dęblin.
Image Credit: Finmeccanica
