Tucano
The Tucano is a turboprop basic trainer aircraft manufactured by Short Brothers.
The Tucano was developed by the British Short Brothers company as a replacement for the Jet Provost as the basic trainer for the Royal Air Force (RAF), as laid down in Air. In 1985, the Tucano was selected in preference to the Swiss Pilatus PC-9 and the British Hunting Firecracker. On February 14, 1986, the first Garrett engined Tucano first flew, and on December 30, 1986, the first production aircraft flew. In 1989, since its first deliveries to the RAF, the Tucano has been operated primarily from No 1 Flying Training School at RAF Linton-on-Ouse to provide basic fast-jet flying training to RAF and Royal Navy (RN) student pilots. The deployment is officially to 72 Squadron, 207 Squadron and 76 Squadron. Training course on the Tucano requires student pilots fly around 130 hours during their training course before progressing to the Hawk T1 aircraft at RAF Valley. The Tucano has been proven to be 70% cheaper operationally than its predecessor.
The Tucano has a crew of one to two. It has a maximum speed of 274 kn and a range of 900 nmi. It incorporates a Garrett TPE331-12B turboprop. Armament includes 1,000 lb of stores on four underwing hardpoints.
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