At a press briefing this week, Airbus Military expanded on their unsolicited proposal for a 6th MRTT, as announced in DWP last week.
Valentin Merino, who managed the MRTT project for Airbus Military, said that the company was keen to still explore the 5+3 option that expired in 2006.
He spoke of the 200 skilled conversion jobs atQantas Defence Services (QDS) that would benefit from such a move and the potential to do further conversion there should the company win the Indian tanker competition.
The company is hoping to hear from the Commonwealth by the end of the financial year about a decision.
However, ADM understands that QDS is turning the conversion hangar into an MRO facility (see the February edition of ADM with a From the Source interview with Qantas Aviation Services Glenn Brown for more) and has no further plans to undertake further conversion work.
But if Airbus Military comes back to QDS with a firm plan for more conversion work, who knows what will happen.
And another MRTT to sustain wouldn¹t hurt the books either.
Stay tuned.