The RAAF’s new MC-55A Peregrine airborne intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and electronic warfare (ISREW) aircraft has made its first overseas deployment, with one aircraft currently operating in the Philippines.
Flight tracking data from Flightradar24 showed that aircraft A51-004 flew from RAAF Base Edinburgh in South Australia to Clark Airbase near the Philippine capital Manila on 28 July.
At the time of writing, the aircraft has flown missions from Clark on six occasions between 30 July and the 7 August.
Each of these missions lasted between four and nine hours, with the aircraft mostly staying over or close to Philippine airspace near Mindoro and Palawan islands and remaining visible on Flightradar24.
It did however turn to the west further into the South China Sea on four occasions, disappearing from Flightradar24 for 3-4 hours on each occasion.
A Defence spokesperson confirmed the deployment of the Peregrine to the Philippines to ADM, saying that it was deployed as part of Australia’s longstanding engagements in the Indo-Pacific region.
Defence however did not respond to specific questions about the nature of the deployment or the type of missions being flown from the Philippines, although the flight profiles during the periods when the aircraft could not be seen on Flightradar24 suggests that it could possibly have been flying in the vicinity of the Spratly islands, Scarborough Shoal or other disputed reefs/features in the South China Sea.
The Spratly islands are the subject of a six-way territorial dispute involving China, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Taiwan and is also (in)famous for China’s Great Wall of Sand, where it has reclaimed reefs and turned them into island bastions with airbases, harbours, missiles, radars, and other sensors.
The RAAF has previously flown missions to the South China Sea from Clark as well as Butterworth in Malaysia and Singapore using the P-8A Poseidon Multi-Mission Aircraft and the now-retired AP-3C (EW) Orion.
The latter have been replaced by four Peregrines, which are assigned to the RAAF’s 10 Squadron based at Edinburgh. They are based on the Gulfstream G550 executive jet airframe and heavily modified by L3Harris for the ISREW mission.