France’s Direction Générale de l'Armement (DGA; Directorate General of Armaments) announced that it had accepted delivery of another Airbus A400M Atlas heavy-lift tactical transport on February 14, increasing the number of examples delivered to the French Air and Space Force (FASF) to 21 airframes.
The delivery of this latest aircraft (serial 0127/F-RBAU) comes less than five months after the FASF received its 20th aircraft on November 22, 2022. It will soon join the rest of the FASF A400M fleet at Orléans-Bricy Air Base (BA123), where it will join one of the two operational Atlas units that are home-based there: Escadron de Transport 1/61 (ET 1/61; Transport Squadron 1/61) ‘Touraine’ or ET 4/61 ‘Bearn’.
In a press release, the French DGA highlighted that the aircraft delivered to the FASF this year are all of the final development material standard – the latest version of the A400M that has been certified by the DGA. “The aircraft also has the latest standard self-protection suite for better tactical engagement in a contested environment for its missions of airdropping equipment, paratroopers, or even landing assaults on any type of terrain,” the DGA added.
In total, France has ordered 50 A400Ms from Airbus Defence and Space. With this latest delivery, 29 aircraft remain on order. France was the first nation to start operating the Atlas, with the first examples entering operational FASF service with ET 1/61 at Orléans-Bricy in August 2013. France intends to field 25 A400Ms by the end of 2025 under its Military Programming Law 2019-2015.
