Romania finally commits for 12 F-16s

After years of tackling with the purchase of F-16 fighters, Romania has finally committed.

Today it was announced that the Romanian Ministry of Defense has signed the contract and already paid 100 million US$ for 12 F-16 used fighters, to be purchased from Portugal. The planes will go through an overhaul / upgrade procedure and are expected to be delivered to Romania in 2016. The full operational capability is scheduled for 2017.

In this project are involved the governments of Romania, Portugal and US. Total value of the contract is 600 mil. US$ - including not only the F-16 fighters, but all the related stuff. Sometime soon, 9 pilots and 75 maintenance engineers will begin training in Portugal (some rumors say also US). (it's odd that only 9 pilots will be trained for 12 fighters, but probably that's the first lot)

robertro wrote:...(it's odd that only 9 pilots will be trained for 12 fighters, but probably that's the first lot)

It's not unheard of. They'll probably go back and train follow-on pilots. On-site training devices may also be included in the contract so the follow-ons may not have to go out of country for training. At least initially.

Some stuff appears not to be entirely accurate with the news circulating. Romania is not Paying 600 mil, but only around 186 mil Euros. Some units were purchased recently from AMARG (3 I think), and we are putting new equipment in them. 100 mil is for hardware and the rest goes for local aerospace shops who are paid to overhaul, re-equip these 3 units and install software on the 12.

Also the "upgrades" to the planes already flying consist only in minor details like comms and navigation. They will be infact downgraded in their combat capability because Portugal is a NATO founding member and Romania is not. Romanians are in a lower tier regarding classified stuff.

Having said this, the F16's are in a entirely different level of capability than the lancers. The Pilots will like them.

Could shape up to be a nice little program, been looking forward to this one for a while now.

If anyone knows which Portuguese and AMARG serials are involved, please let us know.

Greets,

This was the short listed airplanes from 2009 (the sale was planned along time ago), They are PoAF S/N's. Since then they decided only 9 of these are to be sold.
15125
15126
15127
15139
15128
15129
15130
15137
15131
15138
15140

Source: http://www.tcontas.pt/pt/actos/rel_audi ... 009-2s.pdf

The 3 other AMARG units original S/N's are not yet known to the public.

This was the document I was looking for. Once saw it but forgot to save. Thanks for the info.

Greets,

Pilotasso wrote:Some stuff appears not to be entirely accurate with the news circulating. Romania is not Paying 600 mil, but only around 186 mil Euros. Some units were purchased recently from AMARG (3 I think), and we are putting new equipment in them. 100 mil is for hardware and the rest goes for local aerospace shops who are paid to overhaul, re-equip these 3 units and install software on the 12.

Also the "upgrades" to the planes already flying consist only in minor details like comms and navigation. They will be infact downgraded in their combat capability because Portugal is a NATO founding member and Romania is not. Romanians are in a lower tier regarding classified stuff.

Having said this, the F16's are in a entirely different level of capability than the lancers. The Pilots will like them.

Here is the DSCA release regarding the sale of F16 C Bk 52 to Romania from 2008 https://d.transfer.ro/transfer_ro-19oct-9a7ce97503.zip. So, there is not the case of any downgrading of 3rd hand F16 A MLU sold by Portugal to Romania. Romania was also offered better fighters such as Eurofighter, Gripen etc. And even if the airframe of the MIG 21 Lancer is old and can not be compared with the one of an F16, the avionics (radar, displays, Dash helmet and other) is as good as the F16 bk 40's or even better.

I am not conjecturing anything here, and what you said about the other hulls offered to Romania doesn't change anything infact they would be subjected to the same export restrictions changes regardless of being 1st or 3rd hand fighters. You are just extrapolating things in you own logic and prone to fall in error.

I thought the issue was if the country in question signs CISMOA they are allowed the more sensitive/classified equipment. If not, they don't. NATO membership isn't a requirement for CISMOA restricted equipment from US sources. There are a few F-16 Block 52 operators who either haven't signed CISMOA or have "restrictions" due to previous violations, eg. Egypt. I'm not sure Romania's CISMOA status.

Pilotasso wrote:Some stuff appears not to be entirely accurate with the news circulating. Romania is not Paying 600 mil, but only around 186 mil Euros. Some units were purchased recently from AMARG (3 I think), and we are putting new equipment in them. 100 mil is for hardware and the rest goes for local aerospace shops who are paid to overhaul, re-equip these 3 units and install software on the 12. .

The contract is for 673 million EURO, as announced by romanian officials
I guess Portugal will receive only 186 million EURO, the rest of the money goes to USA

http://www.gandul.info/politica/secretu ... a-11028964

The sim is probably associated with infra structures and a part of it goes for weapons.

You guys should update the \users section for Romanian profile and some adequate tali thumbnail since it's pretty much significant that the deal is done and approved. Welcome Romania to VIPER MAFIA!

ps. Is it already known whether Roms get the extended vstab base for drag chute or stay with short one?

As these are ex-PoAF they are without parachute housing.

Give us some time eh .
We did update the serials database already.

Greets,